


A 2015 Sherlock Advent Calendar

by Odamaki



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Baking, Blizzards & Snowstorms, Christmas, Christmas Cards, Christmas Decorations, Christmas Music, Christmas Presents, Christmas Tree, Family, Family Feels, First Kiss, Fluff, Gen, Hot Chocolate, Huddling For Warmth, M/M, Magic AU, Nutcracker, Pocket John, Potterlock AU, Shifter AU, Snow, Snowed In
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-01
Updated: 2015-12-25
Packaged: 2018-05-04 10:00:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 26
Words: 35,185
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Odamaki/pseuds/Odamaki
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Posted on Tumblr for the 25 Days of Fic-mas challenge. As many Christmassy Sherlock ficlets as I can manage between now and Christmas, based on the tags as follows:  Shopping for gifts, Hot cocoa, Winter wonderland, Christmas cards, Ghost of Christmas past, Naughty and nice, The Nutcracker, Baking, Making a Christmas list, Scrooge, Mulled wine, Ugly Christmas jumpers, Warming up by the fire, Trimming the tree, Christmas party, Family traditions, Christmas without you, Mistletoe, Christmas songs, All wrapped up, Christmas movies/specials, Snowed in, All I want for Christmas is you, St. Nicholas, Christmas morning. <b> Completed </b></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Shopping for Gifts

**Author's Note:**

> Please see "Chapter 26" for a Master List of the contents organised by pairing, universe and main character.

**Shopping For Gifts**

It’s not that Sherlock hates shopping (which he does), nor even that he fails to see the point of Christmas (also accurate), and truth be told the problem isn’t even that he resents being obliged to take part in something so meaninglessly sentimental and puerile and arbitrary as a gift exchange (he does a bit), it’s that the choice is overwhelming.

Sherlock knows people. He knows them merely by looking at them, without effort, so it’s barely a stretch to follow the logical points to see what they lack or need. He can make an educated guess at likes and dislikes and more so, he can hazard at the things even they wouldn’t have thought of.

The downside is the social trickiness that seems part and parcel of this. It’s easy to see the flaws in someone and logically reason the items that might repair this deficiency. Deodorant; useful, nay necessary household item. As a gift? Bad.

Sherlock has learnt this.

Sherlock has learnt this through _experience._

And he’s not keen to repeat it.

This makes shopping tricky because... well, how do you know? How do you know what’s going to be accepted with appreciation, and which is going to be accepted with a false smile, or, more likely, offence. He’s weeded out the obvious things- items relating to personal appearance, income and sex. It still leaves something of an overwhelming choice.

John is even more problematic because he doesn’t like stuff. He doesn’t want things. He doesn’t have much in the way of personal belongings and those that he does are eclectic and generally practical.

Sherlock stands in the middle of a sea of people and commerce and flounders. There’s too much on sale and too few things he’s willing to put money on as a successful gift. He goes home, tail between his legs.

John seems largely unaware of this quandary that Sherlock is suffering through. It’s only the first of December, though. Perhaps it’s unfair to say that John isn’t on board so much as it’s too soon to tell. On the other hand, the lights have been lit on Oxford Street for nearly two weeks now. You’d think he’d take the hint.

“You were out a long time,” John comments, absent-mindedly tidying around Sherlock. The other man lifts up his feet and grunts. John moves the newspapers out of the way and takes a seat, not objecting when Sherlock shoves his cold toes against his thigh.

“No cases?”

“I went to the shops.”

“Don’t suppose you brought back bog roll did you? There’ll be teethmarks around the door if we don’t get some today.”

Sherlock stares at him. How do you shop for a man like this? He tries to broach the topic from a smarter perspective.

“What are you getting Mrs. Hudson for Christmas.” John lowers his paper, surprised.

“I haven’t thought about it. Any ideas?”

“Skunk” Sherlock says promptly. It’s been Mrs. Hudson’s gift for the last four years. She’s never complained.

“...noted.” John shakes the creases out of the newspaper and then feels for a biro in the cushions to start ponderously on the crossword. Presently he asks, “What do you want?”

“Me?”

“No, the pot plants. Yes, you.”

Sherlock considers. This is, if anything, an even worse question than the question of what to buy John. There are things he wants, of course, but which are unobtainable legally, so John won't get them, or else are very expensive, in which case John can’t get them. Sherlock looks at his bare feet. He curls them.

“Socks.”

“Just socks?”

“Yes.” Sherlock’s not bold enough to clarify. John gets the picture anyway. When Sherlock says ‘socks’, he really means some kind of silky Saville Row caress in tubular form.

“I think Father Christmas can manage socks.” John says, trying not to look amused, and failing.

“Don’t be trite.” Sherlock stares at the ceiling. He bites the bullet. “What do you want?” John goes quiet with thought. There are things he wants, of course, but which are unspeakable, so Sherlock cannot know them, or else impossible, in which case Sherlock cannot give him. John wants time back from his youth, his shoulder, and all his collective dead. He wants love.

He stoops instead to match Sherlock’s level.

“Jam.”

“Jam?”

“Nice jam,” John clarifies. He’s not fancy enough to suggest a conserve. Sherlock knows what he means. He means ‘jam’ with an accent and a cloth hat.

“Jam.” Sherlock affirms. Jam is affordable and obtainable. He marvels. Imagine it being so easy. “Ambitious.”

  
“Shut it,” John says good-naturedly.


	2. Hot Cocoa

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dorks with Drinks.

**Hot Cocoa**

“Sit there and tell me if anyone comes out of that house.”

“Hello, hi, where are you going?” John’s only just arrived from work after a morning shift and Sherlock’s rocketing up from the park bench.

“Business,” Sherlock calls over his shoulder. John stands, baffled, until he sees Sherlock scuttling in the direction of the cafe at the end of the road and then sits and thumbs out a text.

[Did you tell me to come here because you needed to piss?] 

[I’m getting coffee.-SH]

[Not walking like that you’re not.] 

There’s an offended silence and John laughs to himself. He settles on the bench and watches the house that Sherlock’s clearly been glued to all morning. It’s bloody chilly; one of those grey, spattering days. John texts again.

[Get me something?]

[I am- SH] 

He returns some minutes later, two paper cups in hand, and passes one over. John, unthinkingly, takes it and drinks from it. He’s heedless of the heat of the drink; years of practice of hasty coffee drinking have given his mouth certain asbestos-like qualities, but this time he splutters his mouthful all over himself.

“What’s that?!”

“You said ‘something’,” Sherlock says, sweetly revenged.

“I meant an adult drink.”

“Well they didn’t have Scotch.”

“Ha-bloody-ha,” John says, peeling the lid off the cup and peering suspiciously inside. “What is it?”

“Seasonal hot chocolate.”

“It’s all sugar.” John swills the drink around a little, and the scum of cream on the top bobs and then up-ends and sinks. “What did you get?”

Sherlock holds onto his cup a fraction tighter. “Americano. Black. Three sugars,” he adds hastily as John shows an interest.

John puts the lid back on the top, grumbling. A moment later, there’s a cup held out by his ear.

“What?”

Sherlock wordlessly jiggles the coffee. John is undeserving. He’s aware of this.

“Are you sure?” The wiggle turns impatient and John takes it, passing Sherlock up the chocolate horror. Sherlock sits down on the bench, the great consulting detective with a tall pecan and maple syrup hot chocolate with whipped cream on the top. And sprinkles. It’s actually fairly tasty. To him at least.

John doesn’t like the coffee either, because of the three sugars, but he soldiers through it as far as he can. “Sorry,” he says, half-way down and looking like he wants to scrape his tongue clean. “I just really don’t like the sugar.”

Sherlock looks at him. Wordlessly he holds out the hot chocolate again. John looks at him. Sherlock, with contrived innocence, proffers the cup.

This, more than anything, tickles John’s sense of humour. He’s well aware that he can be a grump, and Sherlock’s mute offer plays on the fact too well. He laughs almost silently, tongue butting against his teeth, the coffee shaking dangerously in his hand until Sherlock rescues it, and then that starts him off.

“Berk,” John says fondly, when he’s recovered. Sherlock drains the hot chocolate and drops the cup into the nearest bin.

“You don’t know what you’re missing,” he tells John, sincerely.


	3. Winter Wonderland

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lestrade gets a bit of Christmas early.

**Winter Wonderland**

Lestrade leaves the Yard at two, when it’s still optimistically bright out, but by the time he’s driven out of town, collected her from school, driven back and they’ve gone through the rigmarole of turning schoolbooks out of bags and finding something to wear, it’s dark out.

They go out for dinner. Lestrade hates cooking, more so at these times when he can feel the comparisons hanging around unspoken over every plate. That mum doesn’t cut the carrots like that, or that Doug-the-Sport puts such and such on on the potatoes, and in general, Lestrade doesn’t need more excuses to feel inferior.

It’s all part of the sliding scale he scrabbles on every week between Tolerable and Crap Dad.

He tries. He’s just not that good at it. He knows she hates his flat; frankly Lestrade hates it too. They decorated her room together and that helped. He wonders if she hates the restaurants they go to. He wonders if it isn’t all a bit too formal and grown-up for all that she tries to feign adulthood, and perhaps she’d prefer just curling on the sofa with a bowl, watching telly.

Except Lestrade scavenges his meals from the takeaway joints of London most of the time anyway, and he doesn’t need a second-hand lecture about healthy eating.

They push carbonara around their plates and make small talk about school. She pulls self-conciously on the same strand of hair, over and over and over, and says more as the meal goes on and somehow manages to give him less information. Lestrade sees flashes of a stranger in his own daughter; the secrecy brought on by puberty, turning her into a more efficient diplomat than Mycroft Holmes. If he were to take her at her word, he could only conclude that no one anywhere does anything ever of any interest and importance other than perhaps do homework and breathe.

He misses when she was small and would get in a mood and the magical way he could banish the gulf between them by just holding her upside-down or pretending to eat her ears. She’d scream and complain but she’d always end up laughing, hanging onto him.

‘Stop growing up,’ Lestrade thinks at her, helplessly. She will still deign to hug him these days, but now she’ll wriggle out of his arms with a complaint of ‘oh, Daaad’ and a look of embarrassment.

He pays the bill and they leave the bistro, and he turns her away from where they left the park.

“Where are we going?”

“Surprise,” he says, on a whim. They’re fairly close by and the christmas lights glittering up and down the street have reminded him of it. He remembers her, sticky-mouthed with hot chocolate, standing patiently for him to tug each small finger into place inside a glove, the lights glistening over her hair.

“The park?” she says doubtfully. “It’s dark.”

“This end.” He nudges her. “Look down there.”

He points and she cranes her neck down the dark paths and there, at the far end, are thousands of winking lights. “Oh!”

He wonders how she could have forgotten; they used to come every year. They forge through the park, through the gates, into a blaze of Christmas lights and noise and the smell of onions frying in the open air.

She brightens and moves forward, gesturing to him to follow and they loose themselves in the stalls; a cacophony of colour and charm. He buys them both a hot apple juice and they dizzy themselves with everything.

“Look- baubles!” She spends ages carefully picking up each one to admire it, and the peace on her face almost compels Lestrade to forget the tickets in his pocket and leave it at this. His better judgement prevails and promising they can come back, he takes her to the rink.

The band is playing, or whoever it is making music from the bandstand and the air is full of the hiss of skates and the throb of conversation. “Can you even still skate?” She wants to know. Lestrade scoffs, full of fatherly bravado and challenges her to a race.

They’re both terrible at first. They wobble like baby deer around the wall for a lap, her frightened of falling due to the embarrassment, him with the horror of breaking something. Eventually though something clicks back into place; muscle memory, and he remembers how to arrange his feet and manage his weight. He glides experimentally away and leaves her for a lap, still clinging to the wall.

“Come on,” he calls. “Slowpoke.”

“It’s hard!” She yells back over the music. “I can’t!”

“Yeah, you can. Come on.” He offers her a hand and, though she’d never hold it on the street, she grabs it now and lets him pull her along. He finds his confidence and they slowly circle, her eyes glued to the ice.

“Ready?” he asks. She looks up.

“What?”

“Gotcha!” He catches her around the middle and pushes off determinedly, propelling her in front of him over the ice, picking up speed. She clings onto his arms and shrieks and argues and then, the magic of the atmosphere slips into her bones and she’s laughing so hard she’s sagging against him and they have to stop, blundering into the wall.

“Nutter!” she calls him, pushing hair from her eyes. She glitters like the lights, and he has to break the moment to pull her hat over her eyes for a joke because he can see in her both her baby self and the woman she’ll be in a few years time. “Hey!”

“Come on, you can’t catch me.” He blows a raspberry and starts of teasingly slow. She scrabbles to make a liar of him.

Her cheeks are bright with cold and Lestrade’s fingers are going numb, but it’s been a long time since he’s felt warmer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Hyde Park Winter Wonderland is a real thing. :)


	4. Christmas Cards

**Christmas Cards**

“You’re sure you don’t want to type them?”

He shakes his head irritably, not looking up from the blotting pad of the desk. “There’s only two,” he says, clipped and struggling to be polite.

“Oh, that’s not so many,” the nurse says, a touch relieved. “I thought you had a lot to do.”

Sholto shakes his head again, lets his chair be nudged closer to the desk like he’s a child at the supper table, and wills himself to pick up the pen. There are two on the desk, both identical. One is for John. There will possibly be more cards to send this year, depending on who writes to him, but he will reply to those either by e-mail or typing. They don’t matter that much.

These are the ones he has to practice on.

It’s been over a year since his discharge, and over a year again since the wedding, but his arm is still troublesome to him. He spends hours at a time in splints to keep the joints mobile, douses the scar tissue in lotion and inch by aching inch, has managed to claw back some use of it. It’s tedious work.

It’s disheartening.

He can’t hold the pen as he’d like to; elegantly, with enough fine control to permit cursive. It wasn’t enough that he lost took his career and his boys, and his ease of sleep; the blast took his handwriting too. It’s like losing a voice he hadn’t realized he possessed.

He uses his good hand to get the pen tight in the bad one. He could write with the other hand; he’s done it before, but he feels he’s been working hard enough that if he can’t write out a mere six fucking words then what’s the point? He might as well chop the bloody thing off and be done with it. They make prosthetics these days that can hold things. It’d be a superior model to this.

“Do you mind-“ he says to the nurse, who is still hovering. She’s only been here two days, she’ll only be here a few more. She hasn’t quite clicked with him as well as some of the others.

“Alright; can you manage?”

“Yes.”

He can’t be sure, but if he’s going to fail, he’d like to do it in private.

“Alright then. Just shout if you need me.” She leaves, and he closes his eyes for a moment in a little confused prayer. He nearly calls her back. Instead he opens the card and pulls the cap off of the pen.

It shakes in his hand and he nearly loses his grip on the shiny black plastic.

He’d wanted to use his fountain pen, but you have to get the nib at the right angle or else the ink won’t come out smoothly, and he doesn’t have the flexibility in his wrist and fingers to do that.

The signature pen is fat and black and he holds it like a toddler with a blunt crayon. He hesitates again. Even if he completes it, he’s afraid it will look silly. Ugly straggling letters to hint that it’s not just his physical ability that’s gone but perhaps his mental agility also.

Sholto doesn’t like to think this way, but the doubts and malicious thoughts creep in anyway. People are cruel. He can’t stand the ‘poor-Jamesing’.

“Coward,” he tells the hand, and forces it to the top left corner of the white rectangle.

He allows himself one boon and that is to use the whole breath of the card when it’s opened, writing right over the crease.

A ruler helps to keep things generally in line, though he has to keep it on the paper. It’s more a case of drawing lines down at it and letting the ruler stop the nib of the pen. When he lifts it up, the bottom of the words look oddly flat and the spacing of the letters is a bit off, but it’s there, filling the white space, and he’s written it.

DE ‘A R,J U H N

He wipes at the stray dots but they can’t be erased and he has to leave them.

It makes his arm ache. Not just the fingers or his wrist but the whole thing. The muscle complains from the shoulder right down through the length of the limb, and as he doggedly works through the next line of text, it creeps slowly but surely into the trashed muscle of his shoulder blade.

H A P D Y CH R I S T M A S

He’s sweating, just a bit. Sholto rests a moment, letting his hand sag on the desk. He leans back in his chair, letting his body relax, and turns his eyes up to the notice board over his desk.

“Stop bloody laughing,” he tells the photographs there. He won’t be mocked. John’s letter lies on the desk, full of news. John’s a doctor, Sholto thinks, he’s seen worse than this.

He picks up the pen again.

Practice is helping and the familiarity of the last line makes it easier. He has worked out the knack of spacing now, and he fills the remaining space with the blocky capitals.

When he’s done, he sits back and feels a little surge of pride.

J A M E S   S H O L T O

It’s not half bad. It’s an improvement anyway, which is much as he can hope for these days. He smiles, picks the card up by the corner and drops it into the bin.

He takes up the second card. Writes, slowly but with more confidence.

D E A R    J O H N

There are twenty-one days remaining before Christmas. His fountain pen rests at the back of the desk.


	5. Ghost of Christmas Past

**Ghost of Christmas Past**

John keeps the corner that should be empty full of things that aren’t Christmas trees. He says ‘I’m not sure’, when people at the clinic ask if he has holiday plans yet. He implies, without reluctance, that he may be available to be on call throughout the season.

He stops opening post unless he’s sure it’s a bill. John feels this all as cowardice in his bones, but really it’s more like exhaustion. He has little excitement for any of it.

Mrs. Hudson comments on the lack of seasonal cheer around the flat and John tells her ‘It’s too early- later in the month’ and later in the month his excuse will become ‘tomorrow’, because tomorrow is always intangible. He can say tomorrow right up until it’s too late and then swap to ‘I didn’t have time’. It doesn’t occur to him that his refusal and Sherlock’s usual apathy might be fine for them, but the outcome is robbing Mrs. Hudson of something she enjoys.

She’s not stupid. She knows Sherlock finds it tedious and she has an inkling already that John is on tenter hooks about it. They’re going around each other in the flat like cats. As a blessing to them all, she arranges to go to her sister’s again this year, and hopes that by the close of the month, they’ll have sorted themselves out. She doesn’t tell them this- there’s still time to cancel and hang around Baker Street- and she leaves the boxes as a hint, by the door.

‘Please,’ she thinks, ‘don’t let last year overshadow this one’. They deserve one year where nothing goes wrong.

It’s Sherlock who takes the hint. John comes down from his room one afternoon to find him, cross legged in his armchair, untangling fairy-lights.  
John hesitates and then retreats to the kitchen to dump the plate he’s carrying in the sink, and behind him, the soft click-clack rattle of the lights goes on. Sherlock feeds the line out onto the floor and then gets up and plugs the whole thing in by the desk. They wink into life across the boards. Sherlock pounces on the dead bulbs.

John passes, meaning to go back to his room, but he can see Sherlock eyeing the desk and the curtains and the words come out before he can stop himself- “Don’t climb on the desk- use Mrs. Hudson’s stepladder.”

Sherlock tuts. “Inconvenient.”

“Don’t stand on the desk, its unstable,” John reiterates, and then he leaves. He sits on his bed, opens a book, tries to ignore the faint noises from downstairs of Sherlock moving furniture about.

Something clatters loudly and then there’s a solid thump. John moves on instinct. He’s down the stairs before he can help himself. Sherlock turns as he comes in, from the top of the stepladder and says, nonchalantly, “Can you get that?”

“What was that noise?”

“I dropped some books.”

“Books?”

“They were in the way.” Sherlock indicates where he’s got the lights running over the top of the windows and now across the bookshelf towards the fireplace.

“Why have you go that lights on while you’re hanging them?” Irritably, John turns the mains switch off. Sherlock remains impervious. “Hammer?” he reminds him. John passes it up, laying one hand on the step ladder even though it’s stable.

“You hate Christmas.”

“Indeed,” Sherlock taps a nail into the wall and loops the lights over it. He climbs down from the ladder. John stares at him.

“It’s a necessary bother,” Sherlock adds.

“No, it isn’t. No- you never think that. You just ignore it as much as you can and leave it to everyone else.”

“Well, they like it.”

John squints at him suspiciously but he can’t figure out any ulterior motive if Sherlock has one. Sherlock nudges him out of the way with the stepladder and climbs it again to fix the lights over the mirror.

“Verdict?” he asks, holding them up against the wall. John looks, still disconcerted.

“They’re lopsided. A bit higher.”

Sherlock does so and tacks the end of the lights into place. John thinks it would look better with a second string to complete the lap of the room, but he doesn’t say so out loud. Sherlock jumps off of the ladder with a thud and crouches to rummage in the box with one hand, the other feeling for his phone. John watches, wishing he could tell him to stop.

Sherlock holds up a metal clip. “What’s this for?”

“It’s for hanging the wreath on.”

“Where’s the wreath?”

“I don’t know,” John says helplessly. “Why are you doing this?”

Sherlock looks up, feigning confusion. “It’s December.”

“Only the 5th!” John blurts. “It’s early!”

“Which day is appropriate then?”

“I don’t know- the 25th?”

“Christmas day?”

“I don’t know! For God’s sakes, just put it back in the box. You’re making a mess.” John scrubs at his face, “You’re just doing this to test me.”

  
Sherlock looks hurt, just for a moment, then he looks sober. Wordlessly, he starts returning items to the box and John feels like a complete shit.

“Sherlock...”

“My way then. No lights. No events. We eat the same as we always eat, the flat stays the same.”

It’s a low blow, in John’s opinion, to hit in on meal times. “Come on, we could have something on Christmas Day, if you want to,” he relents, wondering if this isn’t Sherlock trying to express that he really is interested for once, and if, yet again, he hasn’t got it wrong.

“You hate Christmas,” Sherlock replies.

“I don’t...” John says, “I just hate-” he cuts short. “It’s never good.”

He has a tally of them in his head- Last year he saw the days between Christmas and New Years in a prison cell, the year before he hadn’t known Mary. That year... Every christmas in his recent past seems to carry a death with it. Christmas on base. Christmas on duty. Christmas in the ward. Christmas with Harry, mopping the kitchen floor.

He’s had enough.

“I just don’t want to do it.”

“Yes, you do,” Sherlock counters. “That’s the problem.” It’s not untrue. John’s always wanted it. He wants to wake up one day of the year, just once, and have everything fall into place. He wants it to be beautiful, and warm. Something from the golden age of Hollywood, with snow in London and carol singers at the door, just for bloody once he’d like to feel a bit of sodding peace on earth and good will to all.

Sherlock pushes the box forward. “Decorate the flat. Buy a turkey. Wear a hideous jumper and make Mrs. Hudson happy.”

“What’s the point?”

“There is no point, you just do it,” Sherlock replies. “Don’t ask me what the point is. You know my thoughts on the matter, but I can say this: I have no intention of derailing it this time.”

John looks at him. He feels stupid; a grown man clinging to the plastic trappings of a meaningless celebration and acting childish over the whole thing. He licks his lip, mouth feeling dry and doesn’t know what to say.

“Otherwise Mrs. Hudson’s going to her awful sister’s house and there will be nothing but shop biscuits.” Sherlock adds.

John closes his eyes. Inhales. Exhales. There are a lot of things he can do right now, some of them tempting, but he decides as he always does, to trust Sherlock.

“It’s still too bloody early. And what am I supposed to put all this on? The hat stand? We don’t have a tree, you ninny.”

The corner of Sherlock’s mouth lifts slightly. “Well I don’t know where you keep it.”

“It’s a tree,” John argues. “You have to buy a new one every year.”

“Why don’t you buy a plastic one?”

“Because it’s Christmas,” John says, and suddenly, just a little bit, it is.


	6. Naughty And Nice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Greg's got plans.

**Naughty and Nice**

“What are you getting me for Christmas?”

“Who says I am?”

Greg grins at the question, stretching out his legs under the table and allowing their feet to touch. Mycroft moves his back a fraction, conscious that they’re in a semi-public place.

“Gregory.”

Greg’s grin turns devious. “Mycroft.”

“Behave.”

“I am.” He picks up his coffee cup and makes a farce of raising his pinky and sipping from the china. “Trying to anyway.”

Mycroft narrows his eyes in mock-suspicion, and drinks from his own cup. They are in the salon of an upmarket hotel; somewhere discrete and not too populated. A lot of their meetings are like this; at least, the meetings that aren’t about business. Even then, Mycroft acts like they’re contestants in a prudery competition.

“I know what I’m getting you for Christmas,” Greg announces.

“Do you, by Jove. I shall be sure to clear some space in the wardrobe for the novelty socks.”

“Come on, I don’t give you anything that shite.”

“No,” Mycroft admits. Greg lacks a little in the gift-giving department, but he does put some effort and thought into it. Last years cufflinks may still be languishing in their box, but they weren’t offensive. “What is it?”

“Not telling,” Greg says, pleased with himself. “You’ll have to find out.” He puts down his cup. “I have Christmas off work.”

Mycroft lifts his gaze from his saucer in surprise. “The family?”

“Nope. Charlotte’s coming over New Years weekend, but I’ve got Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and Boxing Day to myself.”

“Oh?”

“So... what will you be doing?”

Mycroft hesitates over the question. He has long-since established himself as a Scrooge of the greatest proportion, and last year was a patent disaster that he has no interest in repeating. “Undecided,” he says, cautiously.

“Good!” Greg looks like the sun and a chorus of angels have descended on him. “So you’d be around?”

“I may.”

“Do you want to come over? Christmas at mine.”

Mycroft is taken aback at the idea. “Well.” He is conflicted. A short mental battle takes place in the court room of his mind. For the prosecution: Greg can cook but not to any standard, it will all be necessarily rather budget, the flat is horrible and the less said about the mattress the better, and his one christmas tree is made of tinsel and bought from Woolworths circa 1995; the most hideous thing Mycroft has ever seen. For the defence: Greg.

“Or...”

“Mine,” Mycroft concurs with relief and then too late realises this is what Greg has been angling for all along. He frowns. “You’re getting coal for Christmas.”

Greg chortles. “I knew you’d say no if I just asked,” he teases. “Can’t take it back now.”

“I wouldn’t,” Mycroft returns, offended, “Though I ought.”

“It’ll be nice,” Lestrade promises, “We can decorate your tree, eat a goose, each,” Mycroft nearly laughs. “We can...listen to the classical whatnot on the radio.”

“Do you mean carols at Westminster?”

“Yes? I don’t know? Probably. I promise, on Christmas Day, not to get between you and the Queen.”

“Greg.”

“No, i know you two have a bit of a thing. I’m not jealous.”

“Greg!”

“She’s a lucky lady.”

“Stop taking the...”

“Log fire,” Greg continues, leaning forward. “That’ll be nice. Just you, and me. A few drinks.” he softens, “Bit of time together, out of sight.”

It would be nice, Mycroft thinks. His home is his castle and the one place he knows he can neither be judged nor spied on. A neglected part of him perks at the idea, with it’s overtones of Dickensian charm. A proper fir tree, the furniture beeswaxed so the whole room smells edible; nothing of the gaudy electric strings of lights but candles, and glass ornaments. Pinecones for the fire. Goose, as Greg correctly suggested, gravy, bread sauce, cranberry, sage and onion stuffing steaming, fresh winter vegetables and champagne, and baked ham sticky with marmalade glaze and cloves studded through the fat, and the blue fire of a christmas pudding doused over with cream and brandy butter and-

“Mycroft.”

“Hm, yes?” Mycroft returns to the present to find Greg rather close to him. He’s smiling that dopey, pleased, lop-sided little smile that he gets when he’s disgustingly in love.

“So I can come over then?”

“Yes, I suppose.”

“Open presents by the fire?”

Mycroft rolls his eyes, though he isn’t half as annoyed as he pretends, “If it can’t be avoided, yes, and mulled wine, and Tchaikovsky, even though he’s overrated.”

“Fantastic,” Greg all but whispers in his ear. “And after that I’m going to shag you silly on the carpet.”

Mycroft coughs and loosens his collar, Greg retreating back to his chair.

“Coal,” he repeats. “Most definitely coal.”

Greg grins again, giving him a look that penetrates even the thick tweed of Mycroft’s weskit.

“Worth it.”


	7. The Nutcracker

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock gets a gift.

**Nutcracker**

The gift is early. Uncle Rudy has never been well known for his sense of proprietary, but give the man his due, he is punctual. The box is as long as Sherlock’s forearm and twice as thick. He drops it carelessly on the table as he enters the flat.

“Something for you, dear?” Mrs. Hudson asks, squinting at the postmarks with great curiosity. “Ooh, from abroad. Who’s that then?”

“Uncle Rudy,” Sherlock says disdainfully. “Must have had a falling out with the family. He never sends gifts. God knows what he expects me to do.”

“It’s the thought that counts,” Mrs. Hudson chides. She gives the box a little shake. “There’s something quite heavy in it.”

“Leave it alone.”

“It’s just exciting. I like it when you get presents. Don’t you like it?”

“Hardly,” Sherlock says, not untruthfully. With the exception of Mycroft, people never know what he likes or wants so they never buy him anything he can appreciate. Mycroft, contrarily, has all the capability but no interest at all in acting on it. Coldly, he denies Mrs. Hudson the pleasure of satisfying her curiosity by shoving the offending package under the sofa and going back to his experiments.

There it stays until the small hours of the night, after the clocks have chimed the final twelve hours and Sherlock has run out of litmus and patience, and the whole of the street is hushed and sleeping. He throws himself down on the sofa, forgetting the item. It’s not until one of his hands brushes against it, that he recalls its existence.

With some displeasure he fishes it out by the strings and drops it into his lap. He sniffs at it. It smells of paper and something indescribable yet familiar; a touch of the outdoors, maybe. Sherlock can’t be sure. He picks at the knots until the give and the brown paper falls away in crisp folds to be discarded on the floor. The box is made of wood stained a deep, deep red; Sherlock smoothes his fingers against it and can’t help but admire the lustre. Old, he thinks, very old.

It’s of the correct size to hold a bottle of something, he thinks, but he can’t feel the characteristic shift and slosh of liquid inside. There are no markings on the outside either, the box is blank.

There’s a note. A few lines scrawled on card in Rudy’s muddled script.

_Sherlock-_

_Your mother says you’re being a miserable hermit. Found this poor chap on one of my excursions and thought you could keep each other company._

_Don’t be unkind. He’s been through a lot. Patch him up, there’s a lad._

_-Ruby._

Sherlock clucks with distemper, dismissing the difference in name as a blot of the pen. What ludicrous thing has the stupid man come up with now? He fiddles with the fastenings, which are stiff and small, and finally levers open the lid of the box.

It is a doll.

Sherlock lets the lid fall flat against his leg and stares at it. His first thoughts are all indignation. A doll? What the devil did he want with a doll? Was this a joke? Rudy has a poor sense of humour, that’s to be sure, and Sherlock doesn’t like a joke unless he’s the one to laugh last and laugh loudest

Nonetheless, it is… like nothing Sherlock’s ever seen

The doll is male, which is one thing in its favour. The eyes are closed as though it is sleeping; yet as Rudy’s note hinted, it doesn’t seem to be at peace. The mouth is drawn down in the corners in an unhappy, grieving expression, and the brows are likewise tensed

It has been painted masterfully, Sherlock thinks, looking at it. The face is uncannily human in expression, with nothing of the flawless complexion one normally sees on miniatures. He looks closer and notes with incredulity that the eyebrows are actual hair. Minuscule, each one planted at the root as if growing. Eyelashes too, which flutter slightly with his breath as he examines the face. It is remarkable.

Sherlock stands, setting the box aside and fetches his magnifying glass from his coat. Upon further inspection, he believes it is made from real human hair, rather than the poorer horsehair imitations. How did they get it so fine? They must have split individual hairs to do it. The detail doesn’t end there. The little red army uniform is perfectly hand-stitched with real miniature fastenings. Buttons so tiny that Sherlock can barely feel them under his fingers. It’s a curiosity, for certain.

Strange to say he can’t determine what the body is made from either. Certainly not porcelain as it is too dark in colour and slightly warm to touch. Nor could it be wax; the surface is too smooth and soft, yet it doesn’t mar when he scratches at it with a fingernail- some kind of resin, then? But that doesn’t seem right either, for the doll is fully pose-able, yet has no obviously visible joints.

It’s as he’s moving the limbs around that he feels it. A slight click. He feels through the fabric and gives a little tut of disappointment. One of the shoulders is broken. It takes him a while to manage it without tearing off any of the buttons, but upon removing the jacket and shirt he can see the flaw. There is a crack in the material on the shoulder, just by the collarbone, perfectly circular as though someone had tried to punch through it with a nail.

“A pity,” Sherlock says. He cradles the doll in one hand, marvels at the fact that it is perfectly made even under its clothes. There are freckles over it’s shoulder blades and the artist has, in a risqué move, included nipples.

Sherlock lays the doll down on a cushion and picks up the box. There is a layer of velvet that the doll had been laying on, and at the bottom, there is a little drawer. Sherlock pulls it open and tips out the contents into his hand. A soldier’s kitbag in perfect miniature with other sundries, amounting to no less than two more shirts, two pairs of stockings, a pair of shoes, a pair of trousers, a greatcoat, what appears to be an extra pair of soles and heels for the shoes, a woollen blanket, a tiny box that he cannot open, a selection of brushes, a razor that is too small to open, another box and a strap that he assumes must complete the shaving kit, a tin, a powder flask, a tiny mallet, a bag, a belt and a pouch, a second belt for a sword, a whetstone and a canteen.

Perfected above all are the sword and the rifle. The former slides from its sheath as though it were made yesterday. Sherlock tests it against his thumb and is staggered by how sharp it is. It leaves a mark in his skin like a paper-cut. Carefully he puts it away. The rifle is a gun-powder-and-ball type of firearm, which explains some of the little bags in the kit, with a wicked bayonet on the end.

“Napoleonic,” Sherlock comments, intrigued. He puts it all away and as he’s about to being the task of getting the soldier back into his shirt, he notices something else under the velvet. He pulls on it and it unfurls; a scrap of white silk, with a dark stain on one corner. Sherlock narrows his eyes. He knows the rufescent hue of an old bloodstain when he sees one.

There is writing on the silk in a scratchy hand, the ink faded to a filthy orange, but still legible. Sherlock goes over it slowly, parsing the old copperplate and reading aloud.

_Breath begets breath,_

_Wakes from death misbegotten,_

_‘till the end of the twelfth:_

_John Hamish Watson._

“A code?” Sherlock wonders.

“Please, God. No.”

The voice is so small he thinks something has slipped from his mind palace at first, and then a second tiny noise gives him a better sense of the direction it’s coming from. He looks down.

Blue eyes look up at him from a face fixed with fright. Sherlock feels his mouth fall open. He can’t move. The doll has none of the same handicap.

Sherlock sees him react though a fog of disbelief. The doll- the man, the small, impossible man- lifts a hand and touches his own bared chest and his expression turns to horror. He moves back, boots slipping on the cushion, until he has put it between them and all Sherlock can see is the top of his head and his shoulders rising and falling in a panic.

Sherlock lowers the silk to his lap and then, he has to see. He has to see the man move with his own eyes because he doubts his sanity. He reaches for the cushion.

“Don’t!” The voice is curt and authoritative enough to make Sherlock’s hand stop. The face however, lifted over the curvature of the cushion, is desperate. One hand is up defensively, the other feeling in one of the boots; a knife.

Sherlock unfurls his hands in a gesture of peace, still transfixed. He sniffed the packet, perhaps it contained traces of a powerful hallucinogen or else it may have been painted in liquid form on the skin of the doll and absorbed through his fingers, but this is the most lucid and most powerful trip Sherlock has ever experienced. He would like to look away around the flat to see what else is going haywire yet he’s afraid if he does, the man will vanish.

The man seems to be fading regardless, Sherlock realizes. He flickers in and out of sight and-

“Oh, no, that’s me,” Sherlock murmurs. “Tunnel vision. Spots. Prelude to syncope…

His ears are singing. He is aware of one last glimpse of the dolls’ shocked face and then his vision narrows to a grey pinprick and the next thing he feels is the crack of the floor against the back of his head.

________

When Sherlock revives the man is crouched on the edge of the sofa like a little pan, leaning on the tip of his sword. In the time Sherlock’s been unconscious, which can’t have been long, he’s taken the opportunity to dress and arm himself. The kitbag is also reassembled and close at hand.

“Don’t rise too fast,” the man warns.

Sherlock blinks muzzily, feeling at the back of his head. There’s a bit of a bump but he believes he will live.

“How many fingers?”

“One,” Sherlock replies.

“Y’not dead then.”

Sherlock struggles up onto his elbows, and they regard each other warily for a long quiet moment.

“You’re Ruby’s nephew?”

“Rudy.”

“Ruby now,” the man replies, unfazed. He straightens as Sherlock stands and he can’t help but admire the doll’s bravery. Both hands rest on the sword and Sherlock has no doubt that despite the monstrous difference in size, if he made a threatening motion, the doll would draw the blade and have at him.

“John Hamish Watson,” Sherlock says, dazed, pointing at him.

The other pauses. “John,” he corrects. “Just John.”

“Are you real?”

“Yes.”

“Alive?”

“For now,” John replies, soberly. “What day is it?”

“December 6th.”

John looks momentarily stricken. “Lost a week,” he murmurs.

“What are you?” Sherlock breathes. He can see the other swallow, blink, the tiny twitching of his fingers. There are lungs or a facsimile thereof moving in the soldier’s chest because it rises and falls and if that is the case then his body must therefore contain blood also and a heart and who knows what else. Sherlock is lost for a moment in a whirlwind of scientific query.

The man is human but as small as a newborn, yet adult. How does that affect his metabolism? The stomach must be small yet that doesn’t preclude the need for calories; a shrew needs to consume greater than it’s bodyweight daily just to survive, never mind thrive. Sherlock hazards an age between 30 and 45 but the smallness of the man’s features make it difficult to pinpoint more precisely. How does sound affect him? Would a loud sound be more damaging to such small ears in the same way that a baby’s hearing is more easily affected or does the doll have more resilience?

“You’re staring,” John says bluntly.

“You are worth staring at.”

John looks a little awkward at such candor. “What’s your name?”

“Sherlock. How old are you?”

“I was born in 1775.”

Sherlock can hardly swallow. He has a mouthful of inquiries and his head is spinning with the way the bedrock of his whole understanding of the universe is tilting wildly away from him.

“ _Two hundred and forty years_ ,” Sherlock breathes. “How? _How!_ ”

John has no answer, or else he won’t give one. Sherlock plucks up the silk with shaking hands and reads it again. “ _‘Breath begets breath,_ ’clear enough, I evidently exhaled on you as I was examining- ‘ _Wakes from death misbegotten_ ,’ Death, death? Were you killed?”

“I was shot-” John replies, touching his leg. “I don’t remember dying.” The words seem practiced. Sherlock assumes they must be. From 1775 and his scrappy knowledge of history, he can pin John’s living age to be in his mid-30’s which must mean he’s been explaining himself once a year for 200 years at least.

“ ‘ _‘till the end of the twelfth: John Hamish Watson_.’ Then this only lasts until the end of December?”

“Christmas,” John corrects quietly. “Until midnight on the 25th of December, and then…” he gestures to the box. Then blind and deaf and dumb and senseless.

Something of the horror bleeds into Sherlock’s understanding. “You live only a month of each year.”

“Yes.”

“Why? What purpose?”

John gives a dry, bitter little smile. “I grant wishes.”

_______

Sherlock doesn’t sleep. He expects to close his eyes and for John to vanish back into the ether of his own madness, but he remains. John is reserved but cordial. He answers the questions Sherlock poses, and when he doesn’t, Sherlock detects that he genuinely cannot, or else that it’s painful and so he resolves to fill the gaps with his own intellect.

Over the next twenty-four hours he determines that John is not joking about the wishes, and that he has virtually no control over it. That should he survive until the last minute of Christmas day, Sherlock as his keeper will receive whatever it is that his heart most desires.

This is very woolly logic as far as Sherlock is concerned but John shrugs and he is forced to accept it for what it is, as much as he is able to. Sherlock will not even need to verbalise his own wish, it seems. It is merely that whatever he, deep down, wants most, will be given, whether he wants it or not.

Yet he has the feeling that John is holding something back from him nonetheless. For something so kindly as granting wishes, John seems to despair of the idea he will be forced to do so again. This is a sobering thought, and Sherlock would pay good money to know what other people may have wished for, deep in their hearts. He is not so enamoured with the human race as to imagine that it has all been good.

Lucky old Uncle Rudy, though, to be so easily and fully transformed into Aunt Ruby with none of the usual pain nor expense.

John passes the rest of the night in the bedroom upstairs. It’s an enormous space for someone who can barely climb the stairs to reach it, yet it feels fitting. John is an adult and too dignified to be treated like a toy. He moves books off of the shelf and makes himself a fae camp there, like a benevolent hobgoblin. His needs are minimal. He asks for a candle and matches, which provide him with heat and light and a campfire. Sherlock provides him with a mug of clean water and a selection of food, and they diplomatically don’t discuss the empty mustard pot that serves for John’s personal convenience. Sherlock rinses it out in the bathroom sink the following morning, and tries not to show his intense curiosity about how the whole process works too keenly.

Throughout the following day, John keeps to himself, except when he can’t avoid Sherlock’s questions. It strikes Sherlock that this is a deliberate move on John’s part. He wonders how many people he has befriended and then lost over so many years. As Sherlock understands it, this month is all they’ll have. Once John returns to his doll state, he will never again wake at the touch of Sherlock’s breath.

They make no overtures of anything beyond scientific interest on Sherlock’s half and cool reserve on John’s side until evening. Sherlock occupies the living room, still desperate to learn more, but John has asked for an hour or two alone, and Sherlock has felt obliged to give it to him. He smells the faint odour of bacon cooking and knows that John has concocted some sort of mess over the candle from the ham and other portions of food Sherlock provided him. He is wonderfully independent. Sherlock would love to merely observe him doing his chores.

As an aid to thought, and to distract him from spying, Sherlock plays the violin. He deliberately chooses pieces from the late 18th century, on a meandering tour from England to France to Russia and across time up to the mid-1800′s. He is plucking his way slowly through a pizzicato when he smells the tobacco. It is too pungent for John to be tucked in the bookcase. Slowly, Sherlock approaches the door.

The candle burns at the top of the stairs, casting a faint orange glow. John has come half way down the flight, his form a small bundle on the step like a discarded piece of clothing. He has the blanket around his shoulders and his eyes show in the reflection of the cherry glow of his pipe.

John coughs, self-consciously.

“You smoke.”

“Bad habit.”

“Come down and smoke with me,” Sherlock offers. “Have a drink.”

He sees something inside John baulk, and something greater crave the interaction. Whatever he’s doing, whatever John’s story is, Sherlock knows that something in the music has slipped through the mask and John is curious about him now perhaps just as much. He watches as John’s resolve crumbles like sand before a wave.

“Alright.”

He refuses help; Sherlock doesn’t insult him by offering anyway. John throws the blanket up around his neck and, pipe clamped between his teeth, clambers down one step at a time. He’s stiff by the time he reaches the bottom, and limps towards the hearth. Sherlock follows, his only offer to set a cushion from the armchair on the floor.

“Can I sit up?” John asks, pointing to the chair. “I prefer a corner to lean in.”

“Go ahead.”

The seat of the chair is level with John’s head. He looks at it tiredly, and then as Sherlock moves to fetch books to make a stair for him, gives in.

“Lift me.”

Sherlock stoops and sets his hand as a platform for him. John grunts as he climbs onto it, grasping Sherlock’s thumb and shirtsleeve for stability. His hands are warm, Sherlock notes; the life seems to shine out of every part of him.  
He lets John settle and pours them both a drink, his own in a tumbler, John’s in the lid from a miniature bottle of whiskey. They set the ashtray between them, and Sherlock lights up, carefully to keep his smoke out of John’s face.

“Cheers,” Sherlock says, settling in his own chair. John smiles, ever so slightly.

“Cheers.” he replies.

They drink. Sherlock sets the cigarette in the corner of his mouth and lifts the violin to his shoulder. “Any preference?”

“Anything but carols,” John replies, sounding weary. “Play me something new.”

“Something modern,” Sherlock suggests and John nods.

“Something modern,” he agrees, with something that sounds like longing. Sherlock draws the bow across the strings and wonders how it is, living as an anachronism. To never be allowed to progress like the rest of the world. John’s thirst for something new agrees with him on an innate level. He can’t help but pass him one of his own rare smiles.

John, hands cupped around the bottle cap, his pipe glowing,  lifts his lips for the first time in something like a welcome.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TBC


	8. Baking

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mrs. Hudson sorts everything out.

**Baking**

Mrs. Hudson always bakes on a Tuesday, if she’s going to. With Christmas crawling closer and a run of activities with her various groups of ladies, she bakes more. It makes for easy gifts and no one tends to complain if they arrive early or late as long as they’re fresh.

This particular morning, John’s suffering from a dearth in both clinic hours and sense of humour, and has come down to haunt her kitchen. Upstairs, the violin saws tonelessly. Mrs. Hudson puts the radio on to drown it out.

John sits at the table drinking her tea and getting in the way, and though she sweet talks him into peeling a couple of apples for her, generally he’s just taking up space. She doesn’t resent it. He can’t help being so very male.

“Would you boys like anything for Christmas?” she asks, rubbing fats into flour.

“Um. Don’t know. Mince pies?”

“I’m doing those anyway.”

John lapses into silence. He’s in a funny mood, Mrs. Hudson thinks. Not quite like her usual John. “You’ll be around, then? Over the holidays?”

“Hmm. Looks like.” John pushes a little spill of flour into abstract shapes on the table cloth, and doesn’t look up.

“Only I thought you might be off again this year.”

“No.” John’s voice is a little firm at that and Mrs. Hudson gives a silent ‘ah’ of understanding. The violin wails.

“Not fighting are you?”

John neither confirms nor denies this, and Mrs. Hudson can but sigh.

“You two and your little tiffs,” she tuts, waving one finger at him.

“It’s not a tiff,” John grouses, rolling the flour into ugly, damp beads on the tabletop. “We just... don’t see eye to eye.”

“Well, you’re probably being stubborn,” Mrs. Hudson replies. She washes her hands, feeling John simmering away behind her as sure as eggs is eggs. When she turns back to dry them though, she realises that John really is affected by something. “Come on now,” she says, swapping to consolation. She comes up beside him and, as he rarely permits anything as effective as a hug, puts a hand on his opposite shoulder and gently bumps his near shoulder against her side. He wavers and glances up. ‘Like little boys,’ she thinks, ‘They don’t change.’ he could be 12 or he could be 80, right now. He’d have the same expression.

“What’s the matter?”

“It’s nothing,” John says, though it isn’t. “I just... can’t shake off comparing things now to...”

“Oh, John, you can’t do that.”

“I know! I don’t mean to, I just-” He scratches at his upper lip and looks unhappy.

“But you’ve got Sherlock, now,” Mrs. Hudson chides. “And give him his due, he’s a lot better to you than that- her.”

“I know.”

She fetches out her cutters and recruits him in the factory line, stamping out rounds of pastry once she’s rolled it. He does it with more force than necessary, but she allows it. Sometimes you have to get a little punch out. She’s got a handle on their relative personalities now; Sherlock makes a nuisance of himself with high drama and cutting remarks when he’s feeling low; John is a whiner. There’s nothing you can say to stop it, any more than you can ask Sherlock to tone things down. Thankfully, John kicks up a fuss so rarely, it’s not really a hardship.

He glares at the mincemeat as she spoons it into the cases, as if it alone in all the universe is to blame for his various disappointments.

“He has feelings, you know,” she remarks, after a long silence. John looks up, inclined to scoff, despite the fact they both know he doesn’t really feel that at all. Not even a little.

“Don’t you dare, John Watson. You know he’s being very good to you; running around putting up lights. That’s all for your benefit.”

John makes various grumbles of dissent and agreement muddled into one, and relentlessly, she appeals to his better nature.

“Don’t you think it’s throwing it in his face, starting on about how it’s not all-” she makes an expressive gesture, dripping milk from a pastry brush onto his sleeve. “Whoops, sorry dear, that’ll come right out- how it’s not all; well, it’s Sherlock. It’s a miracle he’s keeping the fridge clean.”

John daubs at his sleeve with the dishcloth and goes quiet. Mrs. Hudson, though tempted to put a few more fleas in his ear, has the sense to let the ideas already planted percolate. She wriggles a knife into the summit of each little pie to leave a chimney, and then looks around for the sugar bowl. John finds it first, stirring the granules around.

Mrs. Hudson waits until he’s engaged with sprinkling it over the top of the pies she’s glazed and then drops a bomb on him.

“Do you want to move out?”

John startles and stares at her like she’s just neighed.

“What?”

“Well, if you’re not happy here, you know you don’t have to stay.”

John’s mouth drops open in horror. “That’s not what I meant.”

“So you don’t want to leave?”

“No! Jesus. Why would I want to leave?”

Mrs. Hudson gives him a hard, knowing look and puts the trays in the oven.

“I don’t want to leave,” John stresses, half-rising from the table in objection as she potters deliberately around with the kettle. “I just miss-”

“Miss what? Her?”

“No,” John replies, flummoxed. “I don’t know.”

“I think you should give up worrying about it then,” she tells him pragmatically. She stirs the jar of pie filling around and tuts. “This mincemeat needs more brandy. Where’s that gone?”

She finds the bottle and uncorks it, leaving John to grapple with his own daft quandary while she makes them both coffee. “Do you think this is still alright?”

“What? Yes. Fine. It’s brandy. It doesn’t go off.”

“Best to check,” Mrs. Hudson suggests, upending a generous measure into each mug.

“Jesus,” John says, sagging in his chair. He softens when Mrs. Hudson gently bumps her mug against his.

“I wish...” he begins. “I’d like...”

‘A clip around the ear,’ Mrs. Hudson thinks, though she’d never say it out loud. Upstairs the violin has gone quiet and repentant. Mrs. Hudson bides her time. Within a few minutes, John starts shuffling in his chair. Within another couple of minutes, she catches him glancing at the ceiling.

“I expect he’s decided to call off his sulk,” she observes.

“Hm,” John says, as neutral as he can possibly contrive to be. That says enough in itself. The oven timer beeps and she rises to pull the trays from the oven, the mincemeat bubbling and the pastry beautifully browned. She pours another mug of coffee and plunks it on a tray, shaking out four pies along with it.

“There,” she says. “Take that upstairs and make things up with him. Off you go.” John finds himself compelled to take the tray, the smell of the brandy tickling at his nostrils, and irrevocably he is shooed towards the door.

Mrs. Hudson shuts the door after him firmly and listens for the hesitant tread of his feet on the stairs. She begins her second batch, the mix of the sweet and the sour, the acrid alcohol of the brandy softening to something nicer through the alchemy of heat. It’s quiet upstairs, and then, just softly, there are the first strains of a softer song.


	9. Making a Christmas List

**Making a Christmas List**

_Santa baby, just slip a sable under the tree, for me,_   
_Been an awful good girl, Santa, baby,_   
_So hurry down the chimney tonight._

‘I had fur coats,’ she thinks, looking at the crazy webbing across the ceiling where, some years past, the damp has come in and fractured the plaster. ‘Real ones. Antiques.’

The kerosene stove splutters, reeking though she’s kept it at a modest distance from the bed.

‘I had Egyptian cotton sheets and cashmere blankets.’ Here she has to keep the window cracked open even in the bitterest weather, to stop the heating system poisoning the air. Her thoughts aren’t even bitter, it’s more the gulf of difference between them and now. She can scarcely believe it.

The stupid song goes round and around in her head.

_Santa baby, a ’54 convertible too, light blue._   
_I’ll wait up for you, dear, Santa baby,_   
_So hurry down the chimney tonight._

She could keep going without a car, she thinks. The old man can keep that, but she’d like a few things of a more practical nature. She curls her toes under the blankets and then reluctantly shivers from the bed.

The apartment has curtains, but they’re feeble, and the light creeps in. It’s not early. Even the sunrise is reluctant in these parts. She dresses in a hurry, a saucepan on the single gas ring making the wall slick with steam. She’s got the knack now, of tipping water straight from it into a cup, and it makes tea, of a kind.

_Think of all the fun I’ve missed;_   
_Think of all the fellas that I haven’t kissed,_

‘I’ve been a saint,’ she thinks, with a dose of irony. ‘What’ll I get for that?’

A yacht would be a hassle, though she could stand a boat to get away from here. She holds her hairpins in her mouth as she pins up her hair; washes her face with the quickly cooling water and then opens her one little bag of gleanings.

She remembers her first paycheque; the one she really earned off of her own wits. She’d been in another dingy flat like this. She could have bought anything with it: an extra week of electricity, food beyond staples. She could have bought any of a dozen things she’d needed. Instead she’d spent most of it on a pair of diamond earrings and a cheap black dress.

The diamond’s had fooled; her natural charisma had done the rest. That investment had earned her a second pay cheque. The studs are long gone now. She can’t even remember what happened to them. Probably one had dropped out or she’d carelessly forgotten them somewhere in the days when she’d had more money that she’d needed. The dress had been discarded as soon as she’d been able to afford better.

These days she has pearls. More fitting for her age now, she thinks ruefully, fixing them in her ears. They lend her an air, though. The magic still works. The little bag contains a sampler of perfume, a touch of makeup thieved from department stores. No blood red lipstick, but a softer palette designed to make her seem safe.

_I really do believe in you;_   
_Let’s see if you believe in me._

She fixes her outfit and regards herself in the cracked mirror. Passable. She looks at odds with the apartment now, which is the idea. She steps away, makes her meagre breakfast and stands by the window, contemplating the little town. It’s a change from London. It’s an improvement on the Middle East. It’s got potential.

She brushes off her hands and fetches her bag and coat. The Christmas season is drawing near; people will be out shopping, having a good time. Looking for a good time. Looking for a reward to savour at the end of the year.

She locks her front door though she has nothing worth stealing and sets off, her coat a red splash against the snow, her smile like a jingle. To look at, you’d never guess her destitution. She looks like someone on the up-and-up, who has it made, who will rise like a star to oblige wishes on those less fortunate.

_\- Fill my stockings with the duplex and checks;_   
_Sign your X on the line, Santa cutie._

After all, Irene Adler still knows what they all want.


	10. Scrooge

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sally Donovan's Christmas

**Scrooge**

The rain has cleared leaving brilliantine skies and a bitter wind. Sally pulls her chin into the collar of her coat and pushes down the street against it, her ears aching with the cold. On the corner, a man in a neon vest accosts her with a smile and shakes a bucket at her.

“Spare some change, love?”

She glances over the letters on his vest and says no. He dogs her steps. “Come on, love, it’s for Christmas. Every little helps.”

“No.”

“Do something good for someone for a change,” he suggests. Sally feels her scalp crawl.

“Piss off.”

“Yeah? Well, fuck you too.”

When she reaches the yard, the staff rota is out for the Christmas period; she’s down for most of the holiday season right up to New Year, but she finds herself ambivalent about it. Lestrade, she notes, has wangled at least three days off, which is a turn up for the books. He’s usually her partner over Christmas when he hasn’t got his kid. He’s reliable for a drink and a grouch about the inconvenience of it, and the stupidity of the general public. They wager tiny bets on the drink tank; who and how many.

She has had invites for Christmas, which she has turned down. She loves her sister, but they get along best on opposite ends of the phone line and the less said about her brother-in-law the better. One of these days she’s going to find solid evidence of his weasel drug-peddling ways and there’s going to be fireworks. He’s not even big-fry.

At any rate, her mood is a touch sour to find herself in the office with the rejects, who will most likely spend the day griping about being at work, slacking and cutting corners. There are three of the team in; Edwards picking at his paperwork and slobbed in his chair. His desk is a disgrace. Harris’ is neater, but suspiciously so- Where’re his bloody reports, Sally wants to know. He’s not being kept here for the sole purpose of draining the coffeepot and airing his opinions. She resents having them lumped on her- they’re not worth the wages they draw. The only one she can tolerate is Singer, who is dull, but who like her doesn’t mind working the holidays and will pull shift like any other day.

She drops her bag on her chair and pulls the window shut with a slam.

“You’re wasting the bloody heat,” she snaps. “If you’re too warm, go and do a walk-round the houses.”

The men pull faces at each other and make a slow move towards work. Lestrade is out in court so Sally takes over her desk and tries to break the back of the endless grunt work that needs doing for his cases. This seems to involve a lot of barking at people to stop faffing around and get on with their work.

“That time of the month,” Edwards mouths at Harris, who restrains a snigger because if Sally catches them, their lives won’t be worth living.

“Christmas,” Harris mouths back. “Bah, Humbug.”

Edwards morphs his face into a perfect imitation of Sally’s disapproval.

“Edwards!” They flinch. Sally, however, hasn’t noticed. Head down at her computer, she’s merely brandishing a paper in the air. “Run down to the morgue and get a brief on this case.”

“Yes, Ma’am.”

He comes to fetch the paper and finds himself on the receiving end of a cold look. “And wipe that stupid smile off.”

\---

She steps out at lunchtime for a coffee run and to grab a sandwich before she heads to fetch Lestrade from court, and runs into a familiar face in Tesco.

Anderson’s face lights in a smile of greeting, which Sally tries to return though her hearts not in it.

“Hullo, Sal. Good to see you.”

She nods. “Hi, Phil. How’re things?”

“Good!” He’s an idiot, she thinks, but he’s at least a cheerful one. And despite the awfulness of… what had happened, all their history and the differences that have grown between them, she still wishes him well. “Getting lunch?”

“Me and the boss,” she holds up the basket. Anderson joins the queue with her, and waggles his own sandwich at her. “Christmas special,” he says. “Tried it?”

“Not from Tesco,” she says. “Had the prêt ones though. They’re decent.”

His smile turns a shade nostalgic and she looks down and pretends to examine the snacks on offer between them and the tills. She hasn’t had a turkey sandwich in a couple of years. It’s not avoidance, exactly, but it feels like a link back to the affair.

This time a couple of years ago, they’d made a kind of habit of it. Anderson’s wife would be off on some work thing or hobby thing or whatever, and they’d convene at his house and have a laugh. It was never serious. Sally had never even thought it was exactly a deal-breaker between Anderson and his wife either. If the woman knew about it was still a question unanswered, and probably she didn’t approve, but neither did she take pains to stop it.

A few things Anderson had said had implied that his wife wasn’t exactly a one hundred percent subscriber to monogamy either.

At any rate, somehow Anderson and the sex and his stupid house with all it’s enthusiasm for everything has become entangled with the flavor of turkey sandwiches.

“Why not ham?” she’d once asked, leaning over the look in the fridge, tugging the hem of his sweater down to cover her cold, bare legs.

“Turkey’s low-fat,” he’d answered seriously. “I like turkey. I like you, goosey,” he’d added, grabbing at her from behind, rubbing her thighs until the warmth had banished her goosebumps and then they’d done it on the floor of the living room, nearly bringing down the Christmas tree in the process.

It had been so much fun. Irreverent and untraditional, sure, but it would make her laugh again if she didn’t have a few regrets mingled in there.

“Check out number three please.”

“You doing much later?” Anderson asks, before she steps away. Sally gives him a vague apology. “Work,” she says.

“Still after that raise?” he jokes. She goes along with it.

“Yeah. Chief before 35, remember. Got to get cracking.”

“Bye then.”

“Bye, Phil.”

He’s a hopeless case, Sally thinks, paying at the till. He spends a lot of time still raking over the past. It’s not how she wants to live. She can only ever seem to push forwards.

____

She works through the afternoon, cracking the whip to keep the others on track because god knows, these cases need closing. Finally at three she lets them all slope off for a bitch and a smoke before they all mutiny, and takes a moment to enjoy the empty office.

She scrolls through her phone and finds a missed call from her sister so takes the opportunity to return it.

“Heya!” There’s a clamor of confusing background noise.

“Hi. Where are you?”

“School; it’s rehearsal for the nativity.”

“Oh,” Sally says. She’d forgotten. “What part is he again?”

“Jake’s a sheep.”

“Cool.”

“He’s got a sheep hat and one whole line.”

“Is it ‘baa’?”

“It is.”

“Excellent. Keep up the good work,” Sally replies, amused. Distantly she can hear her nephew scream ‘Hi Aunt Sally!’ at the phone and run off again.

“How come you called?” Sally asks.

“Oh right! I got an e-mail from Sheryl this morning. Her lousy boyfriend’s dumped her so she’s coming for Christmas, and I was wondering if, maybe, you wanted to change your mind.”

“No way, she is?” Sally considers. Sheryl’s a cousin and a great friend; someone to buddy up with at family events and drink in the corner and despise certain people with. Reluctantly, she has to turn it down.

“I can’t, I’m down to work.”

“So ask for the time,” her sister wheedles. “You put loads in. They can survive without you for one day.”

“The boss won’t be here,” Sally sighs. “So I’ll be running the ship. The rota is already out, so… sorry.”

“Jakes want to see you.”

“When’s the nativity?” Sally asks, grasping at a straw.

“The 18th. Are you coming?”

“I’m working, but if no one is being murdered, I promise I’ll try and sneak over before the end.”

“Ok,” her sister says, knowing that whether anyone is being murdered or not, Sally won’t make it. She’s grown used to Sally’s blinkers being impermeable when she’s at work.

“Give my love to Sheryl though. I’ll try and catch her in the New year.”

“Alright. I’d better go. We’re up to the three kings and I’ve lost one.”

“Bye,” Sally hangs up. The office is quiet and stuffy.

____

The troops return in a better mood having vented some spleen at the water cooler, and Lestrade is back in his office, which always makes a difference. They’re his lackey’s really. Sally can’t wait to have her own office, and her own pick of the team.

Thanks to the efforts of that morning though, they can score a line under a few jobs and leave them to be run through the system. Sally eases off on the acceleration and as a gesture of appeasement (though God knows only Singer and Lestrade deserve it) she coughs up for a box of doughnuts for them to share. She would deny that Lestrade had put the idea in her head.

She clocks off on time for once and heads home on the tube, losing herself in a novel and then in the process of wallowing in a bath with the radio on and a take away box of pizza perched on the closed lid of the toilet. It’s not classy, but she’s too hungry to wait until after her bath.

Afterwards, she puts the TV on just for the noise and curls on her sofa, one hand on her phone, the other leafing through a textbook. She had the idea to pick up a second language to help her career along a notch. Thus far she has managed to learn how to introduce herself in Arabic. She’s rather proud of this.

She alternates between making vocabulary notes and staring blankly at Strictly Come Dancing. It’s all glitter and stupidity, and pushy Seasonal Greetings. It reminds her though, how she hasn’t had time to decorate or sort out what she’s going to eat when all the shops are shut during the bank holiday.

Chinese takeaway, she supposes. Maybe Singer would join her. He’s not the best company, but at least he’s not an idiot.

Or she’ll just disregard it altogether. There’s always the telly. She chews on a fingernail and pulls a blanket over her from the back of the sofa. It’d be nice to find a date, she thinks with regret, but the problem is where to find one. The best thing about Anderson was that he comprised to two key adjectives: enthusiastic and convenient.

He was also a push over, which is exactly why they hadn’t continued the affair. In most senses of the word, she outranked him.

It’s not until she’s in bed that a kind of melancholy sets in. The flat is dead quiet excepting the ticking of the clock and the heating’s clicked off so it’s cold. She curls in bed and allows herself a moment to mope. It’s a possibility that her years will stretch before her being just second best even in her own life; the second child, the deputy who is never quite bright enough, or strong enough to be number one.

Sally doesn’t want to die an afterthought. It could happen. Shit happens. It only takes one situation to turn into a fight; it only takes a shot, a knife. Holmes bounces around courting death, but then he’s not a good copper.

Eventually she sleeps.

____

She’s at work again by eight in the morning, having shaken off some of her black mood. The night shift has had a case drop in on them, and they pick it up for them.

“Sal, run down to Barts and see what they’ve got for us,” Lestrade says.

“Sure. Who’s handlng it? Hooper?”

“I think so. If it’s got my name on it she’ll have expedited it.”

Sally rolls her eyes; it’s a long running office joke; and gets her coat.

It’s still bitter out, but she grabs a coffee to take with her and it keeps her hands warm at least. She’s glad she doesn’t work in a morgue.

Molly is thankfully not doing anything that involves being elbow deep in a corpse, and has most of the data they wanted.

“There you go,” she says, pressing a folder into Sally’s hands. “I’ll have another print out if you can wait a bit for the machine to finish.”

Sally considers. “I can wait.”

She has to admit, she doesn’t understand Molly Hooper, but she can respect her. Another hard worker, and although they have vastly different personalities, they’ve had similar experiences.

“Did you see Strictly?”

“No, I missed it,” Molly looks annoyed, but not at Sally. “Was it good?”

“Yeah.”  
“It’s a bit silly,” Molly says.

“Dresses are sometimes a bit snazzy,” Sally answers, and to her surprise, they fall into an easy back and forth.

“Are you working over Christmas?” Molly asks and then when Sally nods, adds, “Me too. Short straw again.”

Sally shrugs. “I’m used to it.”

“Same. Should be quiet though.”

“Well, hopefully. The only downside is that most of the pubs are shut by the time I finish.”

“Don’t tell, but me and the tech keep a bottle in the freezer,” Molly says, “As soon as we’re off the clock, it’s a party.”

Sally laughs.

“Join us,” Molly offers. “There’s a bring-your-own-bottle Indian place down the road.”

“I don’t know when I’ll finish.”

“Nor will we, really. It’s fine. They stay open till stupid o’clock. They have camel-shaped santa baubles.”

“What?”

“I don’t know how else to describe them,” Molly laughs. “You’ll have to come and see.”

Sally smiles, puzzled. “Ok,” she says, and suddenly the season seems a bit more colourful. “Sounds good.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have seen camel-shaped santa baubles before, years and years ago, at an Indian restaurant. They'd clearly had some camel ornaments, sort of bulbous, cartoony things, which someone had enterprisingly repainted as santas.


	11. Mulled Wine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With respect to the people of Mull, if any of them happen to read derpy Sherlock fanfic.

**Mulled Wine**

John watches a little expectantly as Sherlock takes a mouthful of the claret. Sherlock holds the liquid on his tongue, nods and (lips pursed) makes a weakly enthusiastic ‘mmmm’ noise.

“Well, it’s ok isn’t it?” John asks, puzzled. He takes a slurp of the wine, which he’d found on offer at the off-license and is meant to be something famous, and then gently deposits the mouthful back into the glass with a grimace.

“Urgh, ok, that’s not that nice.”

“It isn’t,” Sherlock concurs gladly, abandoning his glass on the desk. John scrapes his tongue against his teeth.

“Cor, that’s horrible. That bastard,” he adds, meaning the man in the off-license. It’s a disappointment. It hadn’t been expensive but it hadn’t been cheapo-plonko either, or at least, not according to the price. His taste buds are telling a different story.

“I wonder if we could do anything with it.”

“Use it to clean drains?” Sherlock suggests, himself still sucking the tannins off of his teeth.

“Hm,” John says, thoughtful and annoyed. He thumbs around the screen of his phone and then tramps off downstairs to Mrs. Hudson’s flat. Sherlock sniffs at the wine and turns his nose up in favor of sorting through his magazines.

John returns with one of Mrs. Hudson’s floral mugs and an orange. The mug rattles.

“Mull,” Sherlock announces.

“Mulling,” John agrees. “It’ll help you _mull_ things over.”

Sherlock wrinkles his nose in distaste. John snuffles his amusement through his.

A saucepan is fetched from the cupboard and John comes begging with it back to the living room. Sherlock willingly upends his glass into it and then follows him back to the kitchen.

He investigates the mug. John’s clearly attempted to follow a recipe, which effort has been reduced on the basis of what Mrs. Hudson had in her cupboard. He stirs the mix with a finger- ground ginger, cardamom, cloves, cinnamon and ground nutmeg. “Sieve,” he mutters.

“What’s that?”

“Teeth,” Sherlock adds. He gets up and digs through a drawer and then comes back with a square of fine cloth; a teabag without any tea.

“Come again? Oh, I see,” John watches as Sherlock decants the spice into the bag, expertly twisting the top into a little knot so they can’t escape but still have room to move around. “No cloves between your teeth. Alright… sugar.”

John fetches a half full paper bag from the cupboard and bashes it a bit to loosen the clumps before decanting a dose into the saucepan along with the rest of the wine. Behind his back, Sherlock finds a paring knife and silently disembowels the orange.

“I was going to use that,” John protests when he spots Sherlock dropping the flesh in the bin.

“It would make it sour; just use the peel.”

“We could have eaten it.”

“You hate eating orange. It’s like citric dental floss.”

“I still would have eaten it,” John argues. He would have. He’s ridiculous like that- he’s so dogged about not wasting things.

John turns on the gas ring and stands there, prodding the mix with a spoon and frowning at it.

“You’ll make it bitter,” Sherlock advises. “Turn the heat down.”

“It is down.”

“Stop glaring at it.”

“Who’s in charge here? You stop back-seat mulling, you.”

“Mull,” Sherlock answers, playing with the sound.

“Mull.”

“There’s an island of Mull,” Sherlock says, the fact drifting up from some unexpected corner of his mind. “Awful place- no cities.”

“I expect the people like it,” John says diplomatically.

“It’s separated from Scotland by the Sound of Mull.”

“What noise does that make?” John wants to know. Sherlock grapples between detesting the joke and loving it.

“Mull,” he suggests, caving to the festivity and he is glad that he did a moment later, when John throws back his head and laughs.


	12. Ugly Christmas Jumpers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Shifterlock AU

**Ugly Christmas Jumpers**

Greg noses his way out from under the duvet, drops to the floor on all fours and has a long luxurious stretch from the tips of his dark paws ending in a shudder down his tail. He un-shifts en-route to the bathroom, clicking his neck from side to side and mentally reminding himself yet again, to buy a new bed. Sleeping in animal form has its advantages in terms of sleeping on an unsound mattress, but it also reminds him that he has no pack to bring home.

For once there are no messages from the yard, and mysteriously, there is one instead from the withheld number that typically messages him from Mycroft’s office. It reads:

‘Due to technical difficulties, now would be an opportune time for you to visit the office. Please bring the following from-“ Listed after that is some kind of florescent lamp and an address.

Lestrade puzzles at it, but as there’s no ignoring it, he showers, dresses and makes his way to the address. It’s a specialist lighting store and the finds himself the bemused owner of a large heat lamp. Still questioning his life, he lugs it to the innocuous looking building where Mycroft keeps his offices.

He inhales out of habit upon passing through the door; but there’s nothing of any note. Sherlock evidently hasn’t been here, nor John or there’d be a darn slight higher level of Shift stress about the place. For somewhere government run and concerning national security, they noticeably lack a lot of top-of-the-food chain predators.

Either that or they’re so stupendous at keeping their shifts under control that he can’t sense them and they aren’t at all perturbed by other people’s shifts either. Anthea greets him at the front desk, which takes the form of her merely looking at him and announcing, “You need a new bed.”

“Um, yeah,” Greg replies, thrown.

“You’ve got fur on your shirt.” She tells him. He rubs at the fabric and can’t find it.

“So what’s going on? I’ve got your lamp.”

“Thank you, I’d noticed,” Anthea replies. “You can take it through.”

Lestrade is more confused than ever. He’s never owned one personally, but he’s seen lamps like this before in people’s houses. Typically in nurseries where the child can’t control their shift yet and the animal form is something fragile or exotic. More rarely, it’s used as a form of therapy for reptilian shifts, who usually spend all their time in human form but still stuffer from heat-withdrawal and a need to reach certain temperatures before they can focus.

Maybe Mycroft has visitors.

He doesn’t strike Lestrade as a snake-shift or anything, for all his coldness. Lestrade’s run across one or two and they automatically make the hair on the back of his neck rise. An innate reaction based on his animal originating from places where reptiles pose a significant threat.

Anthea leaves him at the door, with the cryptic final comment of “He’ll be under his desk.”

This is not what Lestrade was expecting. He’s seen Mycroft’s office before; it’s rather severe painted walls, the portrait of the queen and the big old desk with its red telephone. There’s a painted screen to one corner which, usually folded, has been furled out to provide a discrete corner. There other is the lack of Mycroft; or at least, the lack of the man.

Lestrade’s used to finding him at his desk, looking stern and buttoned up to his chin. Today there is nothing but a discarded heap of blanket under the desk.

“Hello?” Lestrade says, putting the box he’s carrying down. The heap doesn’t move. Slowly he approaches it. It smells of animal; not strongly but his shift has a good sense of smell and he can pick it up and it’s nothing like anything he’s smelt before. He lifts the corner of the blanket and finds nothing but coarse black and white hair.

“Uh,” he says in surprise and then backs off as the heap stirs. A limb with claws pokes free and Lestrade is further astounded by the shape of it. What’s more, it appears to be wearing a jumper made of bright red acrylic. Clumsily the most ridiculous creature Lestrade has ever seen struggles free from the blanket.

The body is swathed in thick black hair, except where the colour is cut through which white and grey in sparse stripes, and where it’s not covered by the ugliest oversized jumper imaginable. The body itself is thick and muscular; inelegant. It rises over the ribs to a crest and the animal would look weirdly short if it weren’t for the nose and the tail. Each is about the same length as the body itself and the tail is an enormous flat brush that bristles up in irritation. The face is inexpressive although somehow it manages to look pained, the eyes squinting. The nose curves towards the floor, darkest at the tip. The claws scrape the floor as it makes a surprisingly fast get away towards the screen for something that walks on its knuckles.

“Mycroft?” Lestrade asks, too stunned to even laugh. The tail disappears behind the screen and a moment later, Mycroft’s voice echoes out.

“What are you doing here, Lestrade?”

“I got a text to come and bring this.” Lestrade taps the box, and then, rather gleeful, approaches the desk.

“You’re an anteater!”

“You’re a dog,” Mycroft throws back caustically.

“I’m a painted dog,” Lestrade replies. “I’m not any old mutt, thanks. What were you doing?”

“I was thinking,” Mycroft answers. There’s a flump as the hideous jumper appears over the top of the screen, and Lestrade can hear him pulling on his clothes.

“You were napping, more like.”

“Oh do shut up.”

“Nice jumper,” Lestrade grins. “Who got you that?”

The screen sighs. “Mummy. You can go, you know.”

“I know,” Lestrade answers, taking a seat and hanging onto the box. He can’t stop grinning. This is the best thing he’s ever learnt. Mycroft Holmes is a giant, novelty-sweater wearing hose-nose. “It’s very cute.”

“It’s the only damn thing in my size,” Mycroft complains, emerging now more respectably attired in his suit. “No one here knits for Myrmecophaga.”

“Not too common, no,” Lestrade agrees.

“I’m the only one in the country.” Mycroft takes a seat.

“Really?” This interests Lestrade. Plenty of people have non-native Shifts and even the likes of Sherlock Holmes can’t say they’re the only example of their type. There are other big cats.

“Yes. Should I want to meet another, I’d have to go to either South America or I believe there’s a small community in India.” Mycroft looks annoyed by this, as though the others have conspired to be born in significantly warmer countries.

“Do you often shift at work?” Lestrade can’t restrain his curiosity.

Mycroft sighs, exasperated. “It helps me think. Anteater minds are quiet and focused. May I take my lamp now.”

Lestrade relents and passes the box over. “I’d have thought you’d have one.”

“I did. It broke.”

“The claws are a bit…” Lestrade comments, miming with his hands. “How do you walk?”

“Funnily enough, I do believe they evolved to be walked on,” Mycroft says frowning. “They’re for digging through termite mounds. I assume you’ve seen my brother’s shift.”

“Yeah, big black cat thing.”

“Yes, most ferocious,” Mycroft says with a trace of sarcasm. “In the wild, anteaters are capable of killing predators with those claws.”

“Right. Well. Not looking to fight you,” Lestrade answers carefully. “Especially not wearing that jumper; that’d be a terrifying way to go.” The thought occurs to him just then that when Mycroft shifted back, he would have been wearing nothing but the jumper behind that screen. Indiscreetly, this thought must show on his face.

Mycroft scoffs, the back of his neck turning red, and hastily sends him on his way. Lestrade goes, still brimming with amusement and curiosity, and with the intention of prodding Sherlock for more information.

____

It’s not till a few hours later, when Lestrade is holed up in his own office getting on with his work, that a package arrives for him.

He opens it, and the spill of wool that comes out of the paper is dark green and ornamented with elfish pompoms. It’s the right size for a dog, even though there’s no way Lestrade would be able to put it on while he’s shifted. Lestrade tries to look annoyed but it’s too good a joke and he looses it when he reads the card that comes with it

“For a more worthy opponent,” it says. “Or else to improve your thoughts.”

“Jesus,” says Lestrade, putting it aside with a laugh. One of these days he’s got to get Mycroft out of that office and into a restaurant with him.

Nonetheless, he takes the ugly jumper home and sleeps on it. It seems to improve the mattress.


	13. Warming Up By the Fire

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 'Nutcracker' Part 2

**Warming Up By the Fire**

“How did you know it was me?” Sherlock asks. John lowers his sword and relaxes his stance.

“Mrs. Hudson always stops for a moment on the turn of the stairs. Besides,” John feels the balance of the sword again in his hand. “You’re loud.”

Sherlock removes his coat and hangs it on the peg, secretly pleased to hear that John’s got things so well figured out. He turns back and takes to his armchair, watching John rather self-consciously move through the last of his drill. He has removed his shirt and Sherlock watches with mute fascination how the muscle moves under his skin. The only blight is the damage to his shoulder.

Finally John stops, putting the sword back in its sheath and wiping at his brow.

“You left the remote upon your desk,” John says. Sherlock glances over. He has.

“I’m sorry.” He retrieves it and sets it by the hearth. “It wasn’t on purpose.”

“Nay, I know.”

John rubs sweat from his face with his shirttail and pulls it on over his head. He watches TV and surfs the Internet with relative ease for someone born more than one hundred years ago, although, as he reminds Sherlock, he has had one month of each year to catch up with the world.

“There was news about a war today,” John adds. Sherlock shrugs.

“Isn’t there always.”

“Yes,” John says wearily. “That’s one thing that never changes.” He sits on the hearth, absently toying with the handle of his sword. “The brutality of men with power.”

“You were a soldier,” Sherlock comments, curious.

“Look where that got me.” John reaches for his red jacket. Now that he’s stopped moving, Sherlock can see him shiver. The hearth must be cold; in fact the flat has probably been chilly most of the day and even he can feel it.

“Allow me.” Sherlock lowers himself to one knee and fetches kindling from the scuttle, which he stacks into the fireplace, adding to it until he’s placed enough to set a match to.

John watches him work in silence, settling himself back against the foot of the red armchair. Somehow they still haven’t built the stack of books for John to climb the chair as he pleases. There’s one by the sofa, where John likes to sit and type with necessary slowness, but instead they have developed a kind of ritual whereby John waits until Sherlock just lowers a hand and gives him a boost to the chair. It’s the only contact they have.

The flames spit and shudder, growing slowly up the back of the fireplace until the wood starts to catch. The smokes rises, and when Sherlock looks down to see if his offered hand would be welcome, John simply moves closer to the fire. Not yet.

“Do you find the flat cold?”

“It’s winter,” John says neutrally. He stands before the fire like he’s on guard and then the warmth seems to permeate through his uniform and he relaxes, arms folded across his chest.

“It’s 2015. You don’t need to be cold,” Sherlock replies.

“There’s not much to be done. I’ve a blanket if I need it.”

“Hardly practical. I’ll find you something.”

“Don’t fuss yourself.”

“I don’t consider it a fuss, John,” Sherlock says softly. John says nothing and Sherlock reads in his posture that he’s embarrassed. It’s surprised him how naturally very proud John is. He has a real distaste for what he calls ‘charity’, and Sherlock wonders if this is something born in John from his human life or something he has learnt in the years since.

The fire mellows from a roar to a crackle. Sherlock turns on the radio for the opera- Verdi’s Rigoletto. Not entirely to his taste but he closes his eyes and listens for the contralto, and hopes Irene is enjoying her new name and life in New York.

“What’s it about?” John asks presently.

“Murder, curses, a fool, a girl and an assassin.”

“A normal story then,” John replies cynically. He feels at his leg. He glances to the seat of the red armchair and Sherlock takes the hint to lean down and offer him his arm. The fire heats their legs and starts to chase away the damp cold of the flat. John stretches his legs out on the seat, and Sherlock regards him.

“How were you wounded?”

“I told you, I was shot.”

“In the leg. I meant your shoulder.”

John lays a hand on the broken patch of his body and his expression sours. “T’isn’t a pretty story.”

“I’m not squeamish, John.”

John considers him closely for a long moment. “You want to know what I am, Sherlock, and there’s no answers for that. I don’t know what I am. I’m a mistake. As for this,” he gestures to his shoulder again. “It was a boy.”

“A boy?”

“Mm. A boy. How much harm can a lad do, I thought, clumsiness, maybe, or neglect. You don’t expect…”

“On purpose?”

“A drill. Like you, he wanted to know what I was made of.”

Sherlock’s mouth is dry. It feels like John has slapped at him. “I would never hurt you.”

“No,” John says cautiously in agreement. “You’re not the same. You treat me decently.”

“He did not. What happened?”

John looks into the fire, leaning on one fist. “I don’t know. The drill came down and then there was a light like the Christmas Day light and then the next thing I knew I was in a box. The same year- I stayed that until Christmas Day and then the wish came and went and I was somewhere else with someone else and I never saw him again.”

Sherlock’s mind flies. “What did he wish for?”

“Nothing good,” John answers, shaking his head. “I’d rather not talk about it.”

“My apologies,” Sherlock murmurs. He folds his hands before his chin and thinks about John’s situation with increasing sadness. He has further questions and yet he can deduce the answers. The thought of Christmas discomforts him. He has, despite everything, no desire to have his wish granted if only because he cannot say with any confidence what it is. He feels as though they are both barreling towards a precipice and cruelly, John has been thrown down it so many times before.

“It’s fine. Let’s just enjoy the time I have,” John says. He rests his hands in his lap. “That’s a good fire. No smoke to it. I haven’t been in a house with a real fire for many years.”

“I admit I should make more use of it.” As if in atonement, Sherlock leans in and drops another log into the flames.

John closes his eyes and then reaches down and tugs off his boots. He flexes his toes, sticking them out towards the fire and then begins the familiar process of filling his pipe.

“You’ll get cancer,” Sherlock remarks. John looks at him from under his eyebrows, his eyes glittering with a sudden flash of humor. He lights his pipe with a flint and puffs on it, eyes narrowing with pleasure.

“Don’t take away one of my few joys in life.”

“There’s always drink,” Sherlock suggests. John makes an encouraging gesture and Sherlock obliges though he knows he shouldn’t egg on John’s intemperance. Nevertheless, he enjoys these evenings with John. The man relaxes and lets more things slip. Or at least he talks more. The narrator on the radio explains the third act of the opera, a complex roundabout of betrayal and love stories.

John sips from his cap and then gestures towards Sherlock. “You don’t have a woman?”

“No. Not my…thing.”

John considers this. “A man?”

Sherlock’s breath catches just a little. “No.”

“Alone then. Like me.” John nods slightly.

“You never married?”

“I was in the army,” John answers, and leaves that to Sherlock’s interpretation.

Outside it is overcast and the road is starting to spot with rain that will never become more than a drizzle. It has been dim and gloomy since the middle of the afternoon and the night promises to be dark and cold. Inside, the fire spills orange light all over them and makes the shadows softer and friendlier. John sprawls luxuriously across the seat of the armchair, one foot bobbing slightly to the beat of the opera.

“Tell me the story,” he asks again, nodding towards the radio.

Sherlock tells him them all.

 

 

**TBC**


	14. Trimming the Tree

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mycroft and Lestrade get ready for Christmas

**Trimming the Tree.**

It’s eight solid feet of pine and it smells phenomenal when Lestrade opens the room where it’s been shut up overnight.

“Blimey! Did you get one big enough?” Lestrade gawps at it. It’s not slender to compensate for the height either. It absolutely fills the whole corner.

“You never commented on the size before,” Mycroft replies. He clears his throat.

“I never needed a stepladder before,” Lestrade answers, a roguish twinkle in his eyes. Mycroft frowns.

“It’s just a tree. I don’t know why you’re insisting it now; it’ll be more impressive once it’s decorated.”

“When are you going to do that?”

“In the next day or two. The decorations have been bought out of storage so it’s just a matter of having them put up.”

He regrets having mentioned the boxes, or in fact, indicating to them where they are neatly stacked out of the way against the opposite wall. Lestrade twists towards them like a weathervane in a storm and looks like he’s about two seconds from taking a headfirst leap upon them. “Alright but why not now? We’re not doing anything.”

Mycroft looks as though the idea is a new one to him. “There’s no need. There are people for that.”

 _“People? You’ve got- you have_ Christmas tree decorating people? Mycroft Holmes, that’s the most soulless thing you’ve ever told me.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

“You don’t decorate your own tree?” Lestrade is incredulous. Considering some of the revelations he’s had about Mycroft Holmes over the years, this feels like a little bit of an overreaction.

“It’s eight foot tall and neither you nor I has anything of an artistic eye.”

“Y’what? I think you are missing the point of a Christmas tree. It’s meant to be- It’s- oh shit, look, it’s just a traditional thing, aright? You’re not living in a department store. It doesn’t have to be perfect.”

Mycroft twists his mouth like he’s chewing on a bee. “I foresee this boiling down to a matter of sentiment versus logic. How offended will you be if I don’t participate?”

“Not much, but at least, can _I_ do it?” Lestrade asks. “You can just watch if you don’t see the point. Have the troops come in and do it professionally after.”

“I don’t understand the importance of it. It feels like a waste of time.”

“I’m not asking you to, you wally. Just- we were going to have tea or whatever, weren’t we? So make the tea, you plonk your arse there and enjoy watching me kill myself trying to stick a fairy on the top that.”

“I shall bear that in mind for your obituary when you fall and break your neck,” Mycroft quips, giving up and going to get the tea. “‘Mourn him not, for he died as he lived-’”

“Trying to get a lot of wood up a fairy’s bum.”

“-being _childish_!” Mycroft splutters, and hurries away before he betrays himself by either laughing or blushing.

\---

There is something to be said for the activity, Mycroft thinks over the rim of his teacup, watching Lestrade exert himself. Mycroft keeps out of the way on the sofa, one ear on the news, and lets Lestrade get on with things. He’s started with the lights and got them out of the packet without tangling them, and even more miraculously, wound around the tree without falling off the ladder.

Now he’s crouched, digging through the bags and boxes.

“What are you looking for?”

“Tinsel,” Lestrade replies, emerging with a box of baubles in each hand. “There doesn’t seem to be any.”

“There isn’t,” Mycroft answers matter of factly.

“Why not?”

“It’s gauche.”

“It’s Christmas!” Lestrade says, exasperated. “It’s allowed to be tacky.”

Mycroft tactfully keeps his opinion to himself and Greg, grumbling, sets to work hanging ornaments. Even he, however, can’t be too disappointed with the cut glass stars and colour-coordinated blown ornaments. They’re a far cry from his battered aluminum ones. White, silver and frosty blue, which he scattered amongst the dark green of the branches until the whole tree starts to look like it’s taken on a touch of winter.

“Did you choose these?” Lestrade is sat on the floor now, stringing silver bells around the bottom of the tree. Mycroft watches him; it seems daft to put all the bells at the bottom and Mycroft wonders if Lestrade has even put any thought to the fact or if he’s still on autopilot from a decade ago, when he and his wife needed an early warning system that the toddler was being devious.

“No,” Mycroft says honestly. “I just told them to get something suitable.”

“I thought so. You’d have picked something warmer,” Lestrade answers with evident satisfaction. “Red and all that.”

“Do you think so?”

“I know so.” He grins over his shoulder, “You like things all Victorian and cosy.”

“Victorian.” Mycroft echoes flatly.

“Candles. The full she-bang. Prince Albert eat your heart out.”

“Fat head,” Mycroft scoffs.

“You like my fat head.”

“ _Gregory Lestrade_ , if you are being rude-“

Lestrade looks at him and then disintegrates in a paroxysm of delighted, snorting mirth.

“I wasn’t!” he chokes, “I am now!”

Lestrade creaks to his feet once he’s finished spluttering, and stands back to survey his work.

“What do you think?”

“Honestly?”

“Yeah.”

“It’s lopsided and amateur.”

“Like me,” Lestrade agrees. “So don’t you dare change it, Mr. Holmes. I want you to come home and look at that bloody disaster and roll your eyes and huff and remember there’s no getting rid of me.”

Mycroft makes a show of sighing and flapping his hands in irritation.

“I’ll have the whole thing consigned to the scrap heap,” he threatens without any weight to his words. “Trashed. Recycled. Chopped up for kindling and given to the poor.”

“You old Scrooge,” Lestrade chides, drawing closer. “You wouldn’t. Too much work in that.”

“I’d _think_ about it.”

“You think about me instead,” Lestrade insists and, dropping his hands to the back of the sofa leans in and thieves a kiss. Mycroft’s teacup rattles. He manages to worm an arm free and set it on the side table before he spills the dregs over his lap. With the other, he finds a certain level of security by holding the back of Lestrade’s belt.

“Not too soon for testing the carpet,” Lestrade offers in a murmur against his ear. Mycroft looks scandalized, and also tempted.

“Really. At our age.”

Lestrade grins and sticks both hands, warm, up the front of Mycroft’s vest.

“Christmas makes you young again.”

All things considered, Mycroft has to conclude that he’s right.


	15. Christmas Party

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> NSY office party.

**Christmas Party**

These were the years when it was all still brand new. Back before Sherlock Holmes was just an unknown name tagged on a junkies crime-sheet, before international horror and in the days when the dust was settling. They’d all been a bit wet behind the ears with big ideas back then.

  
The Met has booked out a hotel conference room for the party and brightened it up with blue and white balloons and a glittery podium. Sally teeters about by one wall on unfamiliar heels and feels exposed without her lumpy copper’s high-vis on.

  
She watches the crowd act likewise. The men waddle around in tuxedos, self-consciously pulling at their collars, unused to real ties. You can tell the inspectors because they wear their suits like it’s more natural to them, all except Lestrade, who always manages to look like a kid in school uniform whatever he’s wearing.

  
He’s a good boss, but half the time Sally expects to look down and see him trailing a bag of PE kit.

He clocks her gaze by some second instinct for being watched and does a double take that’s impossible to find offensive.

“Alright, Boss?”

“Blimey, you’ve scrubbed up,” he blurts and then looks awkward and apologizes.

Sally acts a bit coy but it’s an ego-boost and no mistake.

“This old thing,” she jokes.

“Yeah,” Lestrade says, too eager to agree, and then he hastily backtracks. “No, it looks nice.”

It is an old thing, but he doesn’t need to know that, or that it’s not seen the light of day since her graduation ball. All things considered, it still fits fairly well, though Sally has an inkling she’s going to have a devil of a job squeezing out of it.

She looks across the crowd. Some handsome faces amongst them, here and there.

‘That’d be attractive,’ she thinks. ‘Hold on a second while I writhe around trying to get my frock off like I’m squashing a Peperami out of the plastic.’  
She grimaces.

“I don’t like Cliff Richard either.”

“What?”

“The music?”

“Oh. Right. No, not my thing.”

They stand around awkwardly, feeling the echoes of forgotten school halls and first discos, and then both feel a wave of relieve to spot other familiar faces.  
Lestrade lifts a hand in greeting, Sally just her chin. One of them (none of the ones Sally knows nor hoped for) detaches from the group and shuffles over, breaking into a smile.

“Hullo, nice party.”

“Yeah, not bad. Anderson this is PC Donovan; um, Sally. Sally, Phillip Anderson.”

“Halloo.”

“Hi,” Sally says, unconvinced. Anderson smiles an easy-going smile.

“I’m with the white suit brigade,” he says, acting a little camera-and-sweeping-evidence mime.

“The suits with the extra long sleeves that go right around the back?”

“That’s the one.” He laughs, not offended.

“I haven’t seen one yet,” Sally admits. “How bad is it?”

Anderson shrugs. “Depends,” he says. “We had this one tramp who had basically disintegrated. That was pretty…unsociable.”

“Nice.”

“Ripe,” Anderson agrees. “And we had this other one and the amount of-“

“I can see you two are going to get on,” Lestrade inturrupts, “Christ almighty, it’s a party.” He gestures them off towards the tables at the other end. “Go and get some drinks and stop talking about corpses.”

Anderson grins.

“Shall we?” He offers to Sally. Sally gives a little shrug and a smile. Why not? She barely knows anyone else.

Anderson beams and turns to go. Sally hesitates before following.

“Do you want anything.”

“Nah, I’m fine,” Lestrade says, in the voice of an old-hand who hates big events like this, and has become adept at just getting on.

“I’ll catch you later, yeah?”

“Go on,” Lestrade jerks his chin. “Go have some fun.”

Sally’s teeth glitter under the spinning lights.

“Yes, Boss.”

There’s a throb across the room as the DJ turns the bass up, and a cheer from the people who have been focused on their cups more than the conversation. Across from her, Anderson has muddled into another group of men and women, likely from the labs, and he beckons her over.

“So here it is,” he passes her a glass, voiced raised over the tune, “Merry Christmas!”

“Merry Christmas,” she says, clinking her glass against his. They catch each other’s eye and on an unspoken agreement, they both down their drinks.

The music blares and agrees with them.

Everybody’s having fun.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) Peperami: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peperami
> 
> 2) SO HERE IT IS MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYBODY'S HAVING FUN: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0A8KT365wlA


	16. Family Traditions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nutcracker part 3.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OK ITS NOW ALL COMPLETE GO READ :)))))

**Family Traditions.**

“You don’t celebrate much,” John observes. He has been living with Sherlock for just nine days; it feels like a lifetime already.

“No.”

“Are you a heretic?” John asks, with blunt curiosity but little judgment. His word choice was born in him two hundred years ago. It makes Sherlock smile.

“I suppose I am,” he says, not a bit ashamed. John too accepts this with faint admiration, if not agreement.

“I’ve noticed that. Year on year, there’s less faith.”

“Do you feel England suffers for it?”

John considers, pacing slowly between the salt and pepper shakers on the breakfast table, each as high as his shin. “Hard to say,” he concludes. “A lot’s changed; some better and some worse. Some problems remain but in a different form for a different class of people, but coming through the reign of Victoria, I’ll tell you this much-“ He looks up at Sherlock. “I’ve gotten less worried about being burnt as a familiar.”

“Has anyone tried?”

“Holy water, once or twice, but oftentimes when I find myself with a religious man, I recite the Lord’s Prayer and that always calms them down. Then it’s just convincing them I’m no messenger for the other side.”

Sherlock can’t imagine a less likely angel.

John folds his arms and leans on the rim of the milk jug, looking up at Sherlock. Then he points at him conversationally.

“Do you have no family?”

“A brother,” Sherlock admits.

“You don’t see eye to eye,” John comments.

“Not much,” Sherlock agrees.

“He won’t be coming for Christmas, then? No…seasonal truce?”

“One very much hopes not,” Sherlock says, pulling a face at the thought. He folds his hands in thought and regards John for a moment. The other’s face remains impassive, but Sherlock fancies he sees something else in John’s eyes. “Surely you must be glad of a break from the trappings of December.”

John considers this for a long moment, drumming his fingers on the ceramic of the jug and then shrugs. “Familiarity breeds contempt,” he says, “and a change is as good as a rest, yet… when life is unpredictable, the season is something I can rely on.”

He stares down into the milk for a moment that Sherlock doesn’t dare to interrupt, and then he clears his throat.

“Listen to me talking like an old woman. No, I’ve no real fondness for Christmas; I’ve no objection to taking a turn without it.”

Sherlock inclines his head, inhales and then holds the breath there, full of an idea that wouldn’t have surprised him when he was a child, but feels almost alien from disuse now.

“What,” he begins slowly, “Would you do, John? If you had a choice.”

John’s brows both rise and knit in puzzlement.

“A day,” Sherlock offers. “To do as you wish. What would you do?”

John’s eyes pass away from Sherlock into some other world of possibility and it’s evident that this is a question that John has no more considered an answer to of late, than Sherlock has considered asking it. He takes so long to answer that Sherlock starts to feel that he may have made some social blunder but when he opens his mouth to explain himself, John holds up a hand.

“No, let me think.”

It takes John a long while. He sits on the lid of the butter dish, chin planted in his fists like Rodin has sculpted him. Sherlock says nothing to influence him; he’s genuinely interested in John’s answer.

Finally, when Sherlock has nearly lost himself in a reverie of his recent exploits as a mythologer, John raises his head.

“I have an answer.”

“Go ahead.”

“It’s strange; I had a ready answer and then I thought of all the things I miss, but it’s been so long since I had them that maybe I don’t need them anymore and so all I can come up with, that feels right, is that I’d like to attend service.”

“Church?” John has never struck him as especially fervent, and the thought plants a new uneasy idea in Sherlock’s mind that if mortal men can live as immortal dolls, what else might be true?

“It’s strange,” John repeats, “but yes.”

Sherlock weighs his impulses against his better self and for the first time in a long time, his better self wins out. He picks up his phone.

“Which denomination?”

“Anglican,” John says, and Sherlock tuts at himself. That should have been obvious.

He looks up from his phone. “Are you quite sure?”

“Yes,” John says, misinterpreting Sherlock’s question.

“It will be dangerous. Crowded. High risk of being seen.”

John’s face clears with comprehension and he straightens perceptibly. “Yes, God, yes,” he says, blind to both his blasphemy and his irony. “Let me see London again.”

\---

They go by foot and after dark, both to prolong the experience and make it safer.  The pockets of the Belstaff are deep and with some squeezing, John can just about sit himself in one of them like he’s riding a palanquin. With his knees pressed up to his chin and the flap of the pocket shielding him from the drizzle and unwelcome eyes, it is not a comfortable ride, but it is thrilling.

Sherlock feels John shift against his hip, and keeps one hand flat against the breadth of the pocket like a drunk with a concealed bottle.

He tours slowly down the river, giving John a breath of the old and the new, the ancient familiar landmarks with their scrubbed modernized faces (‘Nothing’s black!’ John comments), and the dazzle of the alien new.

On a quiet corner of a rooftop, John stands until up to his waist is free of the coat and leans out over Sherlock’s hand to look at the lights strung up all over and the glimmering wheel of the London Eye.

“Wondrous,” John says. Sherlock curls his fingers as a sign of appreciation.

He chooses a small, local church; the kind where the congregation is elderly and short sighted and likely to be disregarded if they come out with tales of little talking men. And few.

They sit at the back, ignore the friendly beckoning of the vicar, and occupy a whole pew to themselves. John slips free of Sherlock’s pocket and sits cross-legged on a fold of his coat. Sherlock shifts slightly on the hard wooden boards and feels a twinge of jealousy. He checks his watch. This surely can’t last more than an hour, can it? With that in mind, he’s glad John isn’t a Catholic.

The organ groans and the thin congregation shuffle to their feet for the opening hymn. Sherlock looms, an out of place vulture at the back, sticking up above the crowd even with his head lowered. John stands at military ease on the pew beside him, gaze fixed ahead though he can see nothing.

The opening hymn is younger than John but the man lifts his voice to it anyway, and proves a knowledge of the words that exceeds Sherlock’s, who moves his lips in case anyone is looking. If anyone did, they would think he had a peculiar voice for a man so large. John’s voice is not strong, but he can hold the tune and the pitch is masculine.

They sit again after the final notes have finished skirling from the organ. The vicar mounts the pulpit and begins an introduction to the season, of which Sherlock hears not a word and John seems transfixed by.

‘What are you looking for?’ Sherlock wonders, trying to fathom him. John is forced to sit like a toddler, his legs stuck straight out before him on the wood, and there’s a kind of melancholy in his expression that grows rather than diminishes.

Whatever solace he hopes for, he doesn’t seem to be finding it in the distant ceiling of the church, though that’s where he pins his gaze. The vicar speaks in a pleasant tone and he begins a recital of an Invitation to Confession.

_Lord of grace and truth,_

_we confess our unworthiness_

_to stand in your presence as your children. We have sinned:_

The congregation one and all, old and small and the smallest at the back mutter under their breaths a reply.

“Forgive and heal us.”

Sherlock stares at the backs of heads in hats and set curls and feels that he will never understand what compels people to do this.

_The Virgin Mary accepted your call_

_to be the mother of Jesus.  
_

_Forgive our disobedience to your will. We have sinned:_

Several rows ahead a teenage girl tugs on the ends of her hair, looking for split ends until her grandmother elbows her to remind her to chime in.

 **“** Forgive and heal us.”

Sherlock has heard the arguments before, that it is tradition. That it is moral. That it is a binding experience for families of all types (though he doubts that last is true), yet it feels strange to merge John in with this.

John feels him looking down at him, and briefly he scowls. Sherlock looks away. He supposes it is uncouth to stare at someone while they are praying. Something a tourist would do. Instead he stares at his feet and wishes the accusations were over.

_Your Son our Saviour_

_was born in poverty in a manger._

_Forgive our greed and rejection of your ways. We have sinned:_

“Forgive and heal us.”

_Forgive our self-interest and lack of vision. We have sinned:  
_

Sherlock thinks, if he has been wrong about the world all his life, there is little hope for him now. He has no doubt broken too many commandments.

_Forgive our reluctance to seek you. We have sinned:_

John seems to take it a little personally too. Or else the thought grieves him. Sherlock can see what he’s looking for now- not salvation just forgiveness. It’s still not clear why John feels he needs it in the first place.

As if to shake off the collective guilt and keep his audience with him, the vicar hurries them into another hymn. The organ coughs and they stumble straight into the first line of O Thou Joyful, O Thou Wonderful.

Sherlock doesn’t make the effort to mime this time; instead he reads the words, hunting them down in the program left on the pew. John glances at him, and then gives him a rather solid punch to the thigh. He looks down.

“Sing,” John mouths.

It’s not like the tune is difficult- these hymns are designed for people with musical talent of a specifically regular duh-duh-duh quality. Sherlock scowls but opens his mouth. He has a good voice, though he rarely squanders it on singing. John folds his hands into his pockets and sways slightly from side to side.

_“Loud hosannas singing,_

_and all praises bringing,_

_may thy love, may thy love with us abide.”_

If only.

The service goes on in much the same pattern; a prayer, a comment, a carol and a reminder to be good and never mind Father Christmas, repeat. John seems to take little comfort from the words and conversely plenty from the music, in an up-down of emotion that leaves Sherlock confused.

At the end they finish with a prayer and a moment of silence for them to tag on their own private thoughts. John closes his eyes and touches his own clenched hands to his forehead.

Sherlock looks at the ceiling and tries, yet again, to fathom what it is he will wish for. He tries to fathom John, and can’t. It’s frustrating. Just in case anyone is listening, he looks down at John at the last possible moment and thinks, as loudly as he can, ‘let me know you’.

As soon as it’s over, he has to scoop John into his pocket and get out of the church like they’ve robbed it. They scurry off into the dark, avoiding the milling people until they’re in the cold backstreets with nothing but cats and dustbins for company. 

Sherlock lifts the flap of his pocket.

“Not too stifled?” 

“No, I’m fine.”

Sherlock pauses. He would like to ask if John enjoyed it, but it doesn’t seem to be the right question to ask. Instead he says, “Is there anything else you’d like to do.”

“No,” John says. “Let’s go back now. We’ve had our outing; it’s best not to tempt fate.”

Sherlock agrees and sets his face for Baker Street. John retreats as soon as they are home and Sherlock lets him go reluctantly.  He sits in his armchair and slowly bows out the refrain to O Thou Joyful, O Thou Wonderful. 

“What are you running from?” he murmurs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TBC


	17. Christmas Without You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An intrusion and a confession. (Nutcracker AU)

**Christmas Without You**

Sherlock goes out for most of the morning. He has an appointment with a librarian who knows something about someone’s treatise called ‘The Living Doll’. It’s old and delicate, she explains. It’s the first time she’s ever removed it from the stacks and in fact, before Sherlock’s e-mail had arrived to highlight it in their archive listings, none of the staff had heard of it.

It is a large tome, bound in green and red leather. The colours of Christmas except that age has dulled them and the appearance does nothing so much as remind Sherlock of blood and gangrene.

The contents, he finds, are equally sinister.

The writing is thin and spidery; difficult even for the librarian to parse and in some places illegible to Sherlock. He has her turn pages and snaps picture after picture until, exhausted, she offers to scan him a few of the chapters that he’s interested in and e-mail them to him.

He agrees, and departs with his head full of the idea of the blood sacrifices required to make the sun rise.

It’s a very Aztec concept to find in the pages of a book written in London in the mid 1600’s. Between the froth of pseudo-ecclesiastical language, under the fervor and bile of the writer, Sherlock thinks it comes down to a concept of predator and prey.

On the other hand, it could be mere grotesquery. The etchings of flayed beasts are no better, nor worse, nor more meaningful than the morality paintings of Medieval England. The whole concept could be no more related to John than Fiji mermaids and blue bear skulls passed off as Yeti’s, unless, somehow… it is.

How could he begin to know the difference without testing it?

What bothers him most is that, even if he puts his cynicism aside, he cannot answer one basic question. Why John? Of the millions of people resident on the globe circa 1807, of the thousands available to whatever human tool of whatever magic that had made the Nutcracker, why did they choose John? Why this ordinary, undistinguished solider?

There are only two possibilities; either John was extraordinary somehow even as a mortal man, or the decision was completely arbitrary. Part of him riles in defense of John against this second option. He resents a world that would create something so magnificent and yet build it on such featureless foundations. It’s an insult both to John’s person and Sherlock’s sense of aesthetics. There must be something about John. There must.

He is still thinking about this when he finds the door to 221 Baker Street ajar. His blood freezes.

Another man may have called out; Sherlock looks. He approaches in silence, noting the way that the locks have been skillfully forced. Two men, at least, he thinks. One has stepped aside for the other to enter and in doing so kicked the twist of black plastic bin bags left by the refuse men to one side- so, two men; one deferential.

Sherlock slips through the door, hands free from his pockets should he find himself walking in on a fight. He pulls off his scarf to reduce the risk of strangulation, and notes that the doors to Mrs. Hudson’s flat are untouched. The faint scuffs on the carpet- insouciant men making no effort to disguise their steps- lead up the stairs alone.

Sherlock swings his head to the left. The shopping bags gone, with the hat; Mrs. Hudson’s out. He doesn’t waste time on relief. He climbs the stairs, back to the wall and leans to peer through the gap left between the lolling door to 221b and the doorframe.

It’s chaos in there.

He springs forwards; the silence tells him the intruders are gone, although perhaps not long gone; not long enough to say this happened hours ago, yet long enough to make a pursuit a folly. The tables are overturned.

Books spill across the floor, thrown from shelves and shaken. Loose pages steal traction from under his heels and make him slither forward. The kitchen cupboards have been wrenched open and the floor is a catastrophe of flour, eggs, glass shards, pickles, pots, saucepans and an explosion of angry Jackson Pollock yellow from a bottle of mustard. The fridge has been pulled out at the mains and tipped forward- what a crash that must have made- and lies on the floor like a blocky drunk, trickling fluid. The neighbours might complain, might not- it’s not like they don’t frequently hear irritating noises from the flat.

Two men, Sherlock amends, one carelessly strong.

He scans the floor for blood, chokes on a spill of chemicals; his bromines and iodine, his hydrochloric acid and he is forced to throw open the window and breath out of it for a moment.

The living room is equally savaged. The bowie knife has been removed from the mantle and used to scientifically gut the sofa, which sags on its legs, vomiting sponge onto the floor. Legs broken, Sherlock notes. Lifted then dropped. The destruction has not been wholly wanton, however. His violin, though covered in dust and debris, is intact upon the table. The trinkets in the glass case have been dislodged but the search there has been brief.

For it must have been a search.

Sherlock hesitates at the bottom of the stairs to John’s room. He calls his name.

No answer.

Sherlock climbs the stairs, breath still caught in his throat and while at first it had been the acid and second the dust, now it is nothing but raw fear.

“John?”

Here the violation of privacy feels more acute. The ruins of John’s bookshelf send a pain through Sherlock that he hadn’t expected, and he notes that here alone things are missing.

The box is gone; John’s kit; his rifle- always tucked in the corner of the shelf just behind where John lays his head to sleep- is missing.

“John…” Sherlock swallows, feels the bile wobble up and down in his throat along with his Adam’s apple. An overwhelming sense of failure washes over him, the likes of which he has never felt before.

He sinks to the floor, gazing around the destruction; seeing but without much answer to his observations. They must have been seen, he thinks; or someone has been hunting John since the moment he left Uncle Rudy’s possession. It need not even be personal; to this criminal, John could be nothing more than a means to an end; an item for a collection, perhaps. The last piece of some satanic wheel of power designed to bring he who completes it power beyond compare.

It’s out of Sherlock’s realm of experience and here he flounders between real possibility and ill-used imagination.

A faint noise makes him stop breathing. He lies, propped against the end of the disheveled bed, and listens with every fiber of his being. His pulse thumps. He hears it again; a soft, tremulous scraping noise. It lasts only about a second, but it’s enough for Sherlock to locate it. It’s coming from under him.

He twists and lowers his ear to the floor.

“John?”

It scrapes again and then strengthens itself to a knock.

Sherlock feels at the floor. The boards are old but tight together, and all he achieves by scraping along their edges with his fingernails is a splinter. He gets up and treads the room, hoping for a creak and while he finds two, neither will lift without tools.

Where the hell did John get in?

He puts the question aside- he needs to get John out.

Sherlock nearly falls down the stairs in his haste- he vaults them, half turns an ankle and then does the same on the second flight of stairs.

It’s a four-minute walk to the nearest hardware store. Sherlock does it in a minute. There are few other customers milling around and so hardly anyone to startle when he bursts in.

“Crowbar,” he blurts.

The man behind the counter stares at him. “What?”

“Crowbar- Crowbar!” Sherlock slaps his hands on the counter in frustration. “It’s an emergency. Move!”

“Jesus!” The man stumbles and points towards the side of the shop. Sherlock doesn’t wait- he dives in, finds what he wants and leaves, flinging his wallet at the gaping man’s feet as he goes. He halts a half-second at the door to throw out, “Thank you!” and then he’s gone.

He slams the door to the flat shut when he reenters, lest anyone decide to follow him, hauls himself gasping up to the top of the flat and begins a one-man assault on the floorboards.

The nails scream as they come up; he doesn’t dare work too close to where he calculates John to be in case he drives the iron into him by mistake, and bit-by-bit he has to work across to free the correct board.

It comes up with an eruption of ancient dirt and for a moment Sherlock’s heart leaps into his mouth because there, in the little hollow between the pilings beneath, he catches sight of a puddle of red.

It’s merely John’s coat.

John lifts his arm to reveal a face smeared grey. Sherlock throws the board and crowbar aside to lift him out.

“John. Speak to me.”

John is stiff from crawling in the confined dark, and shaken through and through. He grabs at Sherlock’s hand in a clumsy grip and nods, coughing.

“Are you hurt?”

A shake of the head. Sherlock would not want anyone to mistake his recent foray into religion as conversion, but he offers out silent and heartfelt thanks to the universe anyway.

He carries John down to the relatively calmer atmosphere of the bathroom. Minimally furnished, there wasn’t much here to destroy and what has been done can be disregarded as slightly more extreme clutter.

Sherlock pushes the toothbrushes out of the sink and sets John down in it, seating himself on the lid of the toilet and turning the tap on to a trickle. Wordlessly John thrusts his hands into the stream, not minding that it’s wetting the seat of his trousers, and wipes the muck from his face. When his hands are clean he cups them and drinks greedily, till his sleeves are soaked through.

“That’s enough,” he says, wiping his mouth on the back of his hand. Sherlock turns off the water and fixes the plug into place.

“Are you hurt?” he asks again, unable to believe that he isn’t.

“Sore,” John says, voice hoarse, “Nothing permanent.” He fumbles with the buttons of his coat. “I need something clean,” he says, appealing away from the topic in hand.

“I’ll find something,” Sherlock promises.

He is an inelegant tailor, but a dress sock with three holes cut in the toe end and sheared off at the heel makes a rough tunic.

John washes in the sink until the water stops running grey, taking each piece of clothing off one at a time and laundering it. They accumulate across the back of the sink; the jacket bleeding dye, the cream trousers now rent at the knees. He must have been crawling through dust up to his chin; it’s gone down his collar and falls out in clumps as he pulls off his shirt.

He tugs off his boots and with them the little knife from its sheath. Sherlock’s heart skips a beat; the blade is dirty.

“What-?”

“Rat-“ John says, cutting him off. “Just a rat.”

While he finishes cleaning up, Sherlock sits on the toilet seat, eyes averted, and hastily teaches himself to sew a pair of trousers from a pair of boxer shorts.

John’s arms stick out of his makeshift top like a couple of sticks, and the trousers are short in the leg and bulky around the elastic at the top but between the two he’s covered.

Sherlock rights the armchairs, clears the worst of the mess from around the hearth and leaves John there to warm while he does his best to minimize the damage and stop Mrs. Hudson from barging in with a fluster.

It’s only after he’s managed to get things roughly secured and tolerable that he asks what happened.

John struggles to find words for it; he’s exhausted. Sherlock simplifies the question and starts at the end.

“How did you get under the floor?”

“Rat hole by the radiator pipe.” John looks up, old and solemn. “That’s always the first thing I look for in an old house.”

Sherlock can imagine it. He’d have to go round the skirting boards on his knees to find it, in the filthy corner under the radiator; a hole cut into the boards to allow for the pipe, chewed at the edges as wide as his wrist. A barn door to a rodent, it must have been a horrible squeeze for John.

John rubs thoughtfully at his sides; he scraped himself going down.

“The rat?”

“Surprised to see me,” John answers, looking at the fire and not seeing it at all. “So surprised I could kill it. Still there. Went over the body, got further in. Got lost. Couldn’t get back.”

“Who were they?”

John’s face looks pinched. “He knew I was here. He came singing up the stairs. ‘ _Rat a tat tat, rat a tat tat- No! No! No! There isn’t any room and you can’t stay here_ ’. The Irish man.”

Sherlock doesn’t know either song or man, but he doesn’t need to.

“He’s taken your things.”

John nods, nods deep and then suddenly lowers his head into his hands. “I know. He’ll come back for me. The day after Christmas when-“

“I won’t let him.”

“You won’t have a _choice_. There’s no _choice_ that can save me,” John answers, despairing. “I am damned. We are both damned by this, Sherlock, and I am a coward.”

Sherlock stares at him.

“I am,” John repeats, numb. His hand touches his leg. “Have you guessed why I was shot? Back of the leg- that’s where you shoot at soldiers running away. So you can bring them back, and make them an example.”

“You were deserting?” Sherlock can’t believe it of him.

“It was- there was torture and siege and abuse; it wasn’t warfare. I was sick of Spain.”

“But-?” Sherlock doesn’t know enough of the history to make heads or tails of this. “You need to tell me everything.”

John stares at his own bare feet and then, when Sherlock thinks he won’t trust him, he does.

“There’s a family,” John says slowly. “I don’t know everything; I’ve had to piece it together… but there’s a family that should own me. Somehow… They did it wrong. The first attempt to make me only made me. It didn’t… bind me to them as I was supposed to have been. I was supposed to be a slave.”

Sherlock’s mind flies. “Bought awake once per year for the benefit of the family; to grant whatever they need. Their own personal Djinn.”

“They didn’t get it right,” John repeats. “They gave me too much freedom; it’s wild. I’m always moving. I grant one wish and no matter what the person says, I’m moved on. I don’t know how, but it’s without fail. I never wake up to the same person twice.”

“You said choice,” Sherlock said. “What choice? What’s so important about choice?”

John looks ill. “That’s the price,” he says. “I have to choose to grant the wish or not. It’s down to me, and I promise myself no more evil wishes. I will say no, I swear it to myself and then I am faced with one again…”

“So, there is no choice,” Sherlock concludes leaning back in his chair.

“There is,” John replies, “but I’m a coward and I can never take it. Grant the wish, or grant myself an end.”

“Do or die,” Sherlock says. He leans forward. “Let’s not forget one thing about this Christmas, however,” he says with sudden confidence. John looks at him, surprised and doubtful.

“What’s that?”

“Up till now, you haven’t had me.” Sherlock smiles at the challenge. “Tell me,” he demands, “About the Irish boy with the drill.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (TBC)
> 
> 1) John references the Innkeeper’s Song often performed in Children’s nursery performances of the Nativity:  
> Rat a tat tat, rat a tat tat  
> No! No! No!  
> There isn’t any room  
> And you can’t stay here, There isn’t any room for strangers. The night maybe cold  
> And the wind maybe chill  
> And full of nasty noises in the dark  
> And dangers! No, there isn’t any room,  
> There isn’t any room,  
> There isn’t any room for strangers.  
> Rat a tat tat, rat a tat tat  
> Yes! Yes! Yes!  
> There is a little room and you can stay here,  
> There is a little room for strangers.  
> The night maybe cold And the wind maybe chill  
> And full of nasty noises in the dark And dangers!  
> Yes, there is a little room, there is a little room There is a little room for strangers.


	18. Mistletoe

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Potterlock AU. The first Order of The Phonenix Era, pre-PS.

**Mistletoe**

Molly scurries down the road, hood up, with a rising feeling of panic. There are men on the street behind her and she thinks they’ve followed her from St. Mungo’s.

Cold fingers fluttering, she pulls out her wand under her cloak and ducks down a side street. She closes her eyes and jerks the wand free, focusing as hard as she can on something that isn’t the wintery dark and the footsteps behind her.

“Expecto patronum!”

The magic falls like golden oil from the tip of her wand, wavers, reforms itself and then arches it’s back in greeting.

“Go, get help!” she gasps. The cat turns tail and shoots away like lightening.

“Lumos,” Molly whispers and scuttles back to the main road, hoping. She has faith that there will be someone near by. There must be.

The men behind her are wearing dark cloaks and even glancing over her shoulder she can’t see their faces. There are muggles around and she has to pocket her wand again, but then again, so do they.

She turns another corner into another quiet street and then a man steps out of the doorway, grabs her elbow hard. She’s too stunned to scream, but then she sees the silvery light, leonine, waiting at his master’s side and relaxes.

“Molly Hooper.”

The voice is familiar. The hood tilts back just enough to afford her a glimpse of the nose and mouth and she nods, just once. As the deatheaters round the corner, they apparate away and the road is left silent and empty.

\---

A wall of cold slaps Molly breathless. She stumbles, sick from side-along apparition and the man hauls her upright by her elbow.

“Where-?” she begins. The wind pulls her hair loose in great strands around her face and there is snow in her eyes. He propels her forward and they pass through a gap in a hedge towards a low-slung, dark house.

“In here,” he says. There is a flash of blue and the door clicks open. Molly staggers in after him, and the slam of the door, the absence of the roar of wind leaves her ears ringing.

He secures the door and then drops back the hood of his cloak completely, revealing the thin, aquiline nose, and stern expression of Mycroft Holmes.

“Where are we?”

“It’s safe,” he tells her quietly, and turns his back to make good his word, throwing up a series of protection spells with a mutter.

Molly stands and looks around her, her cloak dripping with melting snow. It is an old kitchen, flag-stoned across the floor with a range and a large wooden table. The place is neat as a pin, and cold with the smell of disuse. Presently Mycroft comes away from the windows and flicks his wand at the stove with a word. It leaps into flames and then one by one the lamps come on, flooding the place with light.

“Is this your house?” Molly asks, cautiously peeling off her gloves.

“My parent’s. They’re away,” Mycroft replies, unclasping the pin of his cloak and sweeping it from his shoulders. He hangs it on a peg by the door and then offers to take hers.

“Oh.” Molly looks around. There’s no dust but the house just feels empty. “For long?”

“America,” Mycroft answers with a thin smile. “They had a sudden compulsion to spend a month in each state.”

Molly takes off her cloak slowly, still glancing around. She doesn’t like to comment but this is a muggle house and there are photos on the wall and none of them are Mycroft. Yet it’s been preserved by magic to keep the dust off.

‘It’s war,’ she thinks, ‘If my family were vulnerable…’ she’d have thought about sending them away too. They wouldn’t have wanted to go either.

“It’s a lovely house,” she says instead. He hangs her cloak beside his.

“I have word from the Order to take you to HQ in the morning. Aurors are dealing with your assailants.”

“Thank you.”

“You realise your job has been compromised.” Molly looks down at the floor, hands nervously smoothing down the front of her medi-witches robes.

“I know…”

“We’ll find somewhere else for you.”

“I still want to help.” She reaches into her satchel and pulls out a roll of parchment. “Here,” she awkwardly plants it on the table next to her. “I hope it’s…”

She hopes the information was worth the risk.

Quietly he takes it. “I’ll see that it’s put to good use. Please excuse me.”

She assumes he leaves to owl it or floo it or apparate it directly to where it’s needed. She’s left alone for ten minutes, the damp steaming away from the hems of her robes. She waits, considering her future.

Mycroft returns with a pair of purple slippers. “Here,” he says, laying them at her feet. “Get warm.”

Molly gratefully changes from her boots and watches him curiously as he moves around the kitchen, taking down dustsheets and shaking off the preservation spells. He opens cupboards. He wasn’t lying at least, when he said that he knew the house.

From the pantry he unloads a fat brown teapot and a tin of tealeaves, cups and saucers.

Molly doesn’t know him well; she’s seen him once or twice at meetings with the Order, listening, never speaking unless invited but usually speaking with good sense. He’s a politician of some sort, she thinks; he spies or has spies in both the Ministry of Magic and the Muggle parliament. She knew him a little at Hogwarts too; a rather aloof Syltherin. He was made a prefect but not head boy, and overall fit into Hogwarts as a superb student but otherwise strangely anonymous. Molly suddenly wonders how long he’s been practicing memory charms.

He’s not the sort of person she imagines making his own tea at any rate; she keeps finding herself glancing around for a house-elf.

There’s butter and bread. He sets the kettle on the range and it soon begins to bubble.

“Can I help?” Molly asks. Mycroft looks at her. It’s the look of someone who has a plan in his head and a set way of doing things and who hasn’t factored anyone else into the equation. She watches him recalculate.

“Yes,” he says. He gestures to the pantry. “Choose whatever you like.”

She goes. It’s very well stocked, for a couple who were going to America. She finds a muggle fridge and a freezer, both full. There’s a whole ham, lettuce, tomatoes, a jar of thick honey and a tin of biscuits. Olive oil. There’s a fruitcake with a glossy layer of marzipan and a pristine layer of royal icing on top, there’s a wire basket of eggs, and a cheese. Molly’s stomach growls.

She comes back laden and they surprise each other. He that she’s taken his word so literally, she that he has found more spells to undo. He lowers his wand and the last of the Christmas decorations fade into view.

“Concealment charms?”

“They left last Christmas. I didn’t have time to take them down and I didn’t want people noticing.”

“You’re very good at charms,” she says, scattering food onto the table. “Can we boil the eggs?”

He nods so as to skim over the awkwardness as quickly as she allows him to.

They cobble together a meal in a muggle way with magical shortcuts. The lights are a little dim; the electricity is off so all they have are candles. They eat at the table. Molly’s starving.

They eat in silence, illogically picking and choosing from the feast. Mycroft eats solidly but neatly and always to the same pattern; a slice of bread carved from the loaf, bisected. He tops one half from left to right with something and consumes it in six bites, then sits back and drinks half a cup of tea. He repeats this with the other half and the remaining tea, and then begins all over again.

Molly discards her manners and eats with both hands; spooning egg with one and holding her toast over the plate with the other, elbows on the table.

Eventually they run out of hunger. Molly washes up using her wand and the sink, Mycroft silently passing her each plate to rinse.

“The room may be a little cold,” Mycroft tells her as they finish. “You can retire whenever you like. Just at the top of the stairs on the left.”

“Thank you.” She dries her hands. “Are you?”

“No, I was going to…” He peters off, not sure what to say. Sit up for a while staring into space as he thinks.

“Ok,” she replies. “I will too then.”

There’s a living room but it’s cold so they simply levitate the armchairs into the kitchen and sit there. Molly curls her feet up on the seat and leafs through a book without reading anything. Mycroft finds batteries for the muggle radio and doesn’t listen to it.

“This was kind of you,” Molly says.

“Just duty.”

“No it wasn’t,” she answers, looking right through him. If it had been, he’d have made someone else go, or taken her somewhere else. This is kindness; he just doesn’t want to be seen as kind. She’s put her neck on the line to steal them information from St. Mungo’s. The appreciation for that is welcome.

“Thank you,” she says again. This time he caves in.

“You’re welcome.”

In the end they put the chairs away and put out the lamps together. At the top of the stairs, Molly pauses. The concealment spells have unfurled throughout the house, but up here it is dark. Mycroft passes her one of the two candles he’s holding.

“Good night,” he says, looking awkward. He hesitates; the sort of hesitation she’s seen before in other men and studiously ignored.

Molly smiles slightly. She leans forward before he steps away and the kiss is chaste but not, she thinks, unwelcome.

“Good night,” she says.

Before she closes the bedroom door, before he moves away down the corridor he blurts out one last question.

“Was it just because of the mistletoe?”

Molly glances up at the innocent bundle of leaves that has waited a whole year for a kiss.

“No,” she says, with another smile. “It wasn’t just the mistletoe, but I’ll say it is, if you like.”

He looks away and she almost doesn't catch his answer, he speaks so softly.

“No,” he says, “You don’t need to do that.”


	19. Christmas Songs

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nutcracker AU cont.

**Christmas Songs**

_“Come they told me, pa–rum-pa-pum-pum,_ ” Jim beats the little tattoo of the song out on the arm of the chair that he’s straddling, examining the pages of the Arab’s book yet again.

Moran cleans his gun in silence, one wary eye on Jim. Things have been intense lately, and the more they go on with the plan the less he feels he understands it. The less he feels he understands it, the less he likes it.

_“Little Baby, pa rum-pum-pum-pum_

_I am a poor boy too, pa-rum-pum-pum-pum…_ ”

The songs are getting on Moran’s nerves. It’s always the same ones with the nonsense words and he can’t be sure if Jim knows that he sings them. Something about them- the endless repetition, the nasal quality of Jim’s voice maybe- puts his teeth on edge.

Jim walks the pair of tiny shoes across the page and sets them down. He has killed a cage of black mice and the blood has made a round brown dot on each item with which he is constructing his circle. Moran took the little corpses out back and tossed them over the hedge; they’d seemed pitiful.

“A miracle,” Jim mutters. He talks about that a lot. The strange fortune that brought The Nutcracker, lost from his bloodline for so many years, back onto his radar.

“Worked it out?”

Jim stares at him until Moran feels uncomfortable. “Worked it out? Worked it out?” Jim mimics. “You’re talking to me. This is my inheritance. Worked it out…” he sneers. “I worked it all out when I was eight years old, tiger.”

“I just want to know it’ll work. I still think we should have taken the doll.”

“Noo, no, no, no!” Jim throws down pages in exasperation. “The doll is no use to us while he’s running around! Inert, Moran. He needs to be inert. Un-owned. _Mine_.”

Moran watches him a moment and then lowers his gaze back to his gun. Jim’s got that shadow about him again. It’s been growing since the start of December and he swears, when it’s dark and Jim’s angry, it thickens. He thinks it must have eyes.

He’s told Jim the gun is in case this Holmes figures too much out and tries to keep hold of the Doll beyond his allowance. What he really means is the gun is to get rid of any trouble. What he really means is that it’s to keep trouble away from him.

Whatever shape it takes.

Jim slides from the chair and makes a show of forgiveness and platitudes. He’s aware that he needs Moran; not just for the muscle. Moran bought him the book. Whatever strange things may happen, that’s irrefutable. Stolen from a house in India, brought back across the continent, written in the 10th century in some unknown desert, it predates the book Moriarty’s family had used to start all this in the 1800’s.

From what he can discern (and the books are all illegible to him), the red and green book had too many translation errors, too many second-hand sources to forge the spell accurately. With this, Jim can fill the cracks; make the Nutcracker bound beyond choice to him and him alone.

The money they can make from it. The very thought excites Moran.

He’s always wanted to be rich.

Jim changes his tune to something older and darker.

_“Under that bed there runs a flood:_

_The bells of Paradise I heard them ring:_

_The one half runs water, the other runs blood:_

_And I love my Lord Jesus above anything.”_

“I wish you wouldn’t,” Moran complains. He clicks his handgun back together and tucks it in the back of his jeans.

“Wouldn’t what?”

“Sing that one. It’s not nice.” He especially dislikes the verse about the hound licking the knight’s blood. Who thinks of thinks like that?

“What song?” Jim asks and this gives Moran a long cold pause for breath because Jim is speaking and the song has not stopped. It goes on; Jim turns back to work, focused on completing as much of the spell with as much of the Nutcrackr as can be worked with and Moran sits and watches him with his blood chilling.

It’s the shadow, he realizes. The humming is coming from the shadow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Jim is singing 'The Little Drummer Boy', and 'Don in Yon Forest'. This second song has a variety of lyrics, some of which are very pagan sounding for a song about loving Jesus. The version I know is A.L. Lloyd's version, which quite rightly was first released on an album called Great British Ballards Not Included in the Child's Collection. Which of course, I listened to as a child and found horrifying. (Although I secretly enjoyed the one about Jesus getting spanked for drowning people. Also check out the Cherry Tree Carol for Joseph being all 'You want cherries, Mary? Well, why don't you go and ask your baby daddy, HMM?') 
> 
> You can read more about it and the different versions of the lyrics here: https://mainlynorfolk.info/lloyd/songs/downinyonforest.html
> 
> tl;dr, English folk songs are weird and hilarious and dark and dirty.


	20. All Wrapped Up

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mystrade fluff.

**All wrapped up**

“For someone who isn’t on holiday yet, I seem to be tripping over you a lot.” Mycroft puts down his umbrella and frowns at his own sofa, which he has come home to find occupied.

“I’m practicing,” Lestrade says, stretching out and showing off a flash of hairy belly. Mycroft twitches. “For next week.”

“Hm,” Mycroft says with uncertain disapproval.

“I’ve been doing paperwork,” Lestrade adds, holding up his phone in his defense. “Well, e-mails.”

“You mean you’ve been pestering Sherlock to solve your cases and go in to the yard to give statements to that effect.”

“Same thing. He owes me anyway. And it’s Christmas.”

“How long exactly do you intend to lean on that excuse?”

Lestrade makes a pantomime of hissing and thinking, like a mechanic trying to invent an estimate.

“Bet I can get a bit more mileage out of it,” he says finally. Mycroft rolls his eyes. “How was work?”

Mycroft inclines his head, taking off his coat. “Rather good, all things considered. Everyone was behaving today.”

“As in being good, or as in doing what you’ve told them to do.”

“As in doing what they want to do, which, coincidently, is exactly what I’ve convinced them is what they want to do.”

“Aces,” Lestrade agrees. He lolls back over the arm of the sofa, stretching. “I put dinner on.”

“Did you?”

“Nothing fancy; relax. I can boil spuds and make stew. It’s stew.”

“I know,” Mycroft says. It’s always stew. Or curry from a jar. He doesn’t mind.

“Needs a bit longer.”

Lestrade reaches out, beckoning for him, and Mycroft allows himself to be reeled into Lestrade’s grasp with an insincere show of reluctance. He’s no lightweight but then Lestrade is no pixie either, and he’s robust enough to be able to keep breathing once he’s got Mycroft leaning against him back to chest. He folds his hands over Mycroft’s sternum and shifts a knee aside to make room for him on the seat of the sofa.

“I’m heading back to the office after dinner,” Lestrade apologizes. “Just, y’know, if you think I’m getting all soft.”

“I shouldn’t dare,” Mycroft replies, though he does and always has. It’s probably Lestrade’s greatest failing; that in certain situations he’s about as tough as wet newspaper. He folds his hands over Lestrade’s.

By his estimation there’s twenty-three minutes until the oven timer beeps, twenty before he really has to pee, and perhaps just as long until his back starts to feel weird from the angle. If not his back, then Lestrade’s going to start feeling squashed and they’ll have to give up or reshuffle.

‘But until then, it’s not so bad,’ Mycroft thinks, closing his eyes. They lie like deadweights on the sofa, strangely fitted together. He lifts one thumb and softly traps Lestrade’s with it. Lestrade squeezes back with all of his fingers and Mycroft feels him smile more than he sees it.

Mycroft shifts his head ever so slightly and feels the touch of the tip of Lestrade’s nose against the tip of his ear.

“Comfy?” Lestrade asks, when what he means is ‘you know I love you, right?’

“Quite,” Mycroft replies, feeling the steady beat of Lestrade’s pulse.

“Very,” he amends.


	21. Christmas Movies/Specials.

**Christmas Movies/ Specials.**

He prefers to read, or walk or frankly do anything else at all but when the temperature drops and his shoulder aches, sometimes Sholto finds himself with not much other option than watching the TV.

He sits with one finger on the remote and glowers through the listings. The midday offerings are dire.

He watches part of a police documentary on Oxford Street and then gets too annoyed and flicks down. He skips passed the cooking shows, the kids TV, the old films dragged out again to fill time with familiarity. He pauses and sits for twenty minutes to follow a program on classic cars, and then with regret it ends and he’s scrolling through the listings again.

He sneers past the reality TV shows, the game shows, the re-runs of American dramas, and then when he’s about to give up, he flicks back up to Channel Two and there he pauses.

Sholto is puzzled by the narration and the image. It’s sport, he’s certain, with a wall. A number of people in polo shirts are running around it, scattering fake snow.

He’s about to turn over when he spots Great Britain on the line-up and the commentator goes on and he finds himself curious. It’s Equestrian, of some sort, he can only assume given the look of the thing and the mention of ‘jump offs’.

The wall is five foot eleven inches high, for the first round. Sholto raises an eyebrow. He’d be just about able to peer over the top of it. In the background, Christmas music plays. There are people in the audience in Santa hats. It’s a slightly strange combination.

He puts the remote back on the arm of his chair and watches; it’s not his usual thing but it’s better than Homes Under the Hammer.

“The rules are simple,” the commentator says, “You either go over the wall, or you don’t.”

The Irish rider comes out, the horse curveting with excitement or nerves, eyeing the wall. It’s ears flick back and forth like radio antennae.

‘Nice looking grey,’ Sholto thinks. It reminds him of the ones that always exercised out of Hyde Park. He remembers the stables at the barracks too. He’d preferred running; horses made him a touch uneasy due to the size of the teeth, but he’d been able to ride and been competent. There was nothing like being 18 hands off the ground to make thirty miles an hour feel incredibly fast.

He’d done high jump as well; this feels like a mix of the two.

“Not enough cohesion,” Sholto comments to the TV as the German rider all but scrapes over the wall. Moments later the commentator agrees. “That’s a bit close.”

Simple task, Sholto thinks, that needs a lot of skill. Despite himself, he finds himself calculating how he’d approach it, even though he knows only a modest amount about horses.

A second Irish rider makes both eyebrows shoot up with a jump that by all rights should have landed both horse and riders in the middle of the wall. Somehow the horse manages to flatten itself out and jump wide, landing clear. “Hm,” Sholto says, impressed. He wonders how high the wall can get.

The round goes quickly; no sooner is one rider finished than the next is starting. Sholto stretches his legs out. You can ride one-handed, he remembers, from watching them play polo. You knot the reins up and use one hand to steer.

Sholto glazes over, watching the steady around and a round of the horses tackling this one great wall.  
Memories keep pinging in his head from Before. He remembers being able to pick out the lads who’d done equestrian; they’d known how to clean boots and look after the leather- all that practice from Tack and Turnout.

They put the wall up, another two rows of lightweight ‘bricks’ made of Sholto doesn't know wat- soft wood maybe, or plastic. At six foot three it’s now taller than he is. He imagines John stood next to it and chukles.

He remembers John trying to scrable over the tall wall on the obstacle course and laughs aloud. He’d propelled himself over with just pure aggression; how he’d managed it, Sholto doesn’t know, but the memory of John Watson foul-mouthed Spider-manning his way up the face of it still made him laugh.

The British rider fouls out, the horse bucking with distaste after clipping out a brick with its belly.

“Well tried,” Sholto grunts, shifting in his chair to get comfortable.

Elsewhere in the house, the bell rings and he glances up but then back to the TV. Someone will get that- probably just the post.

Sure enough he hears steps in the hall heading for the front door.

Round three and the riders are being more careful; letting their horses eyeball the wall hard and measure it up. From one side, only the tips of the animal’s ears and the rider’s upper body are visible.

Riders are dropping out now, quickly. Four have jumped clear, but only just. Two meters of wall; it’s a lot. Sholto drums his fingers o the arm of his chair. He knows the feeling. It’s a simple task- to get over the wall. That doesn’t mean it’s easy. He rubs unthinkingly at his scars, which itch.

One by one he curls the fingers of his bad hand. It’s improved a lot. Apparently angrily rewriting Christmas cards was what it needed.

“James,” the nurse says, coming into the living room. “You’ve got some post”

“Later,” he says, not looking up. They’re putting the wall up again. Six riders left. Six foot eleven inches.

“I think you’ll be interested in this-“

“Later!” She backs off.

Sholto frowns at the TV. It looks impossible, but the German rider’s just pinged over the wall like it’s nothing. The Swiss makes a determined effort and Sholto finds himself lifting his feet in empathy, but he kicks off a brick with his back heels and is forced to retire.

He glances back, there are people talking in the hall. “Close the door,” he calls. She can bloody well flirt with the postman on their own time.

While he’s looking away, the second British rider fails. He turns back to watch the promising Irish rider take down a whole section of the wall. “Go on,” he urges the German rider, who manages it beautifully.

They’re still clattering around in the hall. He scowls and hunkers down in his armchair. The wall goes up again a fraction; the people building it must stretch on tiptoe to touch the very top.

“Who is that?” he mutters, listening to the nurse laugh. They can both bugger off.

He straightens up for the final round; two riders left. Leans on the arm of his chair and watches with interest. He would like to know if they could do it- if they can beat the wall. To his surprise he’s taking it rather personally. “Go on,” he urges, catches his breath and gives a little grunt of pride as the first rider comes over the wall. Perfection. It’s the kind of mastership he can appreciate.

The door to the living room creaks as someone enters. “On the side table,” he says, waving, eyes glued to the screen. The other can’t possible make it too. Fate won’t allow it, surely.

“Are you sure?” they ask.

Sholto swivels in his chair like he’s been given a shock of electricity, half rises. “John.”

He’s taken his boots and coat off, though he’s still carrying his backpack.

“I got your Christmas card,” he says, smiling faintly. He glances at the TV, seems surprised to find Sholto watching ponies. “I mean, I can come back later if you’re busy.”

‘You bastard,’ think Sholto, fondly. “No, you’re here now, I suppose you’d better come in.”

Behind him, the second horse flies over the wall and the audience cheers. Sholto’s deaf to it. He’s too busy flying over a wall of his own.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) I really struggled with this prompt because holiday movies/specials are something I avoid and I can’t see many of the characters in Sherlock especially loving them either, except Molly and Anderson. I guess I could have gone right out there and done a Mollderson, but I said I’d return to Sholto and give him his happy ending, so I have. 
> 
> 2) Olympia Horse Show is an annual event that is just Christmas to me. For some people their Christmas season sport is the football on Boxing Day, but for us it’s the jump-off. Sholto is specifically watching the Puissance event, which is really quite something. This year it was a tie between Jos Verlooy on Sunshine for Belgium, and Hilmar Meyer on Continuo for Germany. They jumped a wall 2.15m high (seven foot one).


	22. Snowed In

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> My favourite trope.

**Snowed In**

“Sherlock! Sherlock- stop!”

John stumbles forwards through the grass and rocks and grabs Sherlock hard by elbow.

“Stop. This is insane. We need to go back.”

“Bishops,” Sherlock gasps. He points. He means the unseen fugitive somewhere ahead of them on the mountain.

John gestures to the stinging white wilderness. “Is going to freeze out here, like us if we don’t _get to shelter now_.”

Sherlock stops. The snow is whipping his hair into his face and the wind is only rising stronger. John’s right. This chase to catch the crook that’s lead them a merry chase from London right up to the Cairngorms is going to get someone killed, and Sherlock would rather it wasn’t John.

“Sherlock, we need to go back,” John turns, face pinched, only it’s hard to see the path in the whirl of snow. Sherlock recalculates. He knows the maps of the area and he knows the paths that they’ve taken. He closes his eyes, feels the bite of ice and weighs up the possibilities.

“This way.”

“Are you sure? We came from over there-” John falters behind him. They were barely prepared for mountain climbing; boots yes, and Sherlock’s memory to orientate by; John’s skill with maps. John insisted on taking a bag with the basics in it, but they’re certainly not kitted out for this unexpected turn in the weather.

With his longer coat and scarf, Sherlock’s faring better and both of them at least have gloves, but John’s moving stiffly and the legs of his jeans are already soaked through.

“We’re not going back, we’re going up; just a little further,” Sherlock insists.

“Sherlock!”

“Hurry up!”

He’s got longer legs and can scrabble ahead of John, who won’t turn back without him. In fact, John digs deeps and puts on a new burst of speed, determined to collar Sherlock and toboggan him down the mountain if he has to.

“There!” Sherlock pauses for John to catch him and points ahead.

“What?”

“There!”

John squints through the snow and sees it, his heart soaring with relief. A tiny house. Not even that; a hut on a tiny promontory.

“A bothy,” he exhales, “Fucking thank God.”

It’s incredibly basic. They lean on the door to shut it and the sudden respite from the wind makes them aware that their skin feels like plastic and their lungs hurt from breathing. “Fire,” John says, noticing the fireplace at one.

He staggers over like he’s drunk, limping, and finds that some kind soul has left dry kindling. “Matches.”

“Lighter,” Sherlock supplies. He has one in his pocket if his stupid hands would co-operate. They’ve gone as useless as flippers though. He scours them together, pulling off his gloves with his teeth and manages to create a flame.

The fire at first is pathetic, but it grows. John stamps around in front of it, shivering violently, his coat dribbling steadily on the floor. The rasp of bark on the logs they add to the fire hurts John’s hands as he drops them clumsily in, but he’s glad at least that he can feel them.

“Your ears are red,” John comments, through chattering teeth. “Rub them.”

“I’m fine,” Sherlock replies, though he does so anyway. He inspects the back of the bothy. There’s a ‘bed’ of a sort made of a simple wooden platform and a bench with another plank set into the wall to make a simple table.

“We’re in luck,” he says. John turns.

“Someone abandoned their camping gear.”

It’s not in great shape, but with the spiders chased away and a check for mice, Sherlock unearths a musty smelling ground sheet, and a sleeping bag, which is in fairly good condition thanks to having been tied up in a piece of tarp.

The fire is going more strongly now, and helping to warm the place. John’s not much drier than he was before though, and Sherlock pushes the sleeping bag at him.

“You’re wetter.”

“It’s not because I’m enjoying myself,” John mutters, and awkwardly begins working himself out of his wet clothes. The coat is ironically all right for the most part, but the waterproofing has had its day and he’d sprung a leak around his cuffs and elbows, which isn’t doing anything good for him. He strings it with his shirt on the bench in front of the fire and wearily starts working off his jeans.

Sherlock likewise shrugs off the Belstaff, which is sodden in places now, though he’s pretty dry underneath. The scarf is only a touch damp so he leaves it on. His trousers aren’t as bad as John’s jeans, but they’re wet down the front from mid-thigh to ankle.

Between them they’ve got one vest, two pairs of socks, a scarf, a shirt and two pairs of underwear in wearable condition, and one sleeping bag.

John worms inside it, looking odd with both arms down inside the tube chafing feeling back into his legs. “Keep moving around,” he advises, all doctor voiced, which puts Sherlock in the undignified position of being trouser-less yet hiking-booted, pacing laps up and down by the world’s smallest fireplace.

Eventually, John looks up with a touch more colour in his face and says, “Swap.”

The snow slaps at the window incessantly and John grimaces at it as he takes his turn marching up and down the bothy.

“We’re not getting out of here tonight,” he says, though he’s known that all along. “Better eat something and try and kip.”

John’s rucksack has water at least and a couple of unimaginative snacks grabbed from the service station on the drive up here. They eat them in silence, drink half a bottle of water each and then go back to huddling in front of the fire.

“Swap back,” Sherlock suggests. “My trousers are mostly dry.”

John reaches out and feels them. “They’re still damp and disgusting,” is his verdict. “And the sleeping bag is still warmer, even if they were dry.” Sherlock can’t quite hide a look of exasperation.

“Oh sorry, should I take your rubbish at face value.”

“I was trying to be noble,” Sherlock says, wriggling free of the sleeping bag.

“Well if your noble bum is warm enough for a bit, I won’t say no,” John concedes, taking the bag. He stifles a yawn.

“Go and sleep.”

“I’ll sleep a bit; wake me in thirty minutes and have the bag back.” John eyeballs him. “I mean it.”

“Yes, yes.”

“Sherlock. I mean it. Wake me up.”

“Go to sleep.”

John doesn’t sleep. He lies down in the sleeping back, the hood pulled up and relishes the warmth, but he doesn’t sleep. Instead he listens to the wind howling and the steady tread of Sherlock’s feet as he goes back and forth, slower and slower. He ducks his head into the sleeping bag and checks the luminous hands of his watch. It’s been forty minutes.

“I said to wake me up.”

“You were awake,” Sherlock points out. He looks pale in the dark; just a long white shape half lit by the fire.

“Are you cold?” John asks.

“Not too badly.” John doesn’t believe him. There’s a draft coming in under the floor from the door and Sherlock’s standing in a gawky manner, like he’s trying to stop his knees knocking.

“We can just share,” John says, pragmatism winning out over awkwardness. He wants to sleep, Sherlock needs to; they both will only find any rest if they can get warm.

“Is it big enough?” Sherlock looks doubtful.

John considers. “Throw your coat over the top and it’ll do if we leave the zip open a bit.” It’ll still be a tight fit.

They both go about the operation with a kind of grim-faced seriousness that it really doesn’t deserve. Sherlock hikes his socks up as far as they will go while John fusses with the zip and deciding if he wants to be at the back of the sleeping bag or the front. The Belstaff is still a bit damp around the sleeves, but the bulk of the coat is dry and with the collar down by their feet, it’ll make a passable blanket.

John ends up at the front, on the basis that Sherlock’s legs are ridiculous and also the rest of Sherlock is equally ridiculous and insists that he has to sleep ‘on the right’.

“There is no ‘right’, its someone else’s mank old sleeping bag,” John says wearily, getting up to allow Sherlock in. “It’s all ‘wrong’.”

They go through a silent pantomime after that, trying to fit four feet into one confined space and who is going to lie exactly how (answer: both on their sides, or else they won’t fit), and what to do with the apparently spare arms they seem to have. John zips them in as far as possible and tugs the Belstaff over them.

Sherlock’s knees knock into the backs of John’s and his feet are like ice. The man is all limbs, John thinks, and breathing. He breathes a lot down the back of John’s neck and can’t decide where he wants to put his one arm and keeps twitching it about.

“Sorry,” Sherlock mutters, accidently knocking John with his hip.

“These boards are hard,” John comments, subtly trying to shift so he hasn’t got all his weight on his hipbone. Doing so angles him so that he has his back square to Sherlock’s chest.

“Bit…cozy.”

It is warm; it’s gloriously toasty after pacing around in the nippy air.

“Don’t fart,” John says, to break the tension, and it works because Sherlock laughs faintly, making the pair of them shake.

“I won’t.”

“I might.”

“You’ve not eaten anything to make you flatulent,” Sherlock says with some authority.

John grins in the dark. “That won’t stop me,” he says. Sherlock shuffles his arm again. “Just put it down.”

Slowly Sherlock lowers it on the other side of John and they lie still for a long, silent moment, getting used to the feeling of one of them having an arm around the other. John closes his eyes and lets tiredness take the edge off of all his normal concerns. It’s all a bit too close and the circumstances aren’t the best, yet it feels too much like something askew has finally clicked into place for him to find any real discomfort in it. On the contrary.

“John?”

John lifts his head slightly, accidently brushing Sherlock’s chin with his crown. “Mm?”

“I apologize for getting us caught in a blizzard. I overestimated how well we could run up a mountain.”

“It’s fine,” John says. He pats his arm. “Go to sleep…. Your feet are cold.”

John shifts again to ease his hipbone and exhales a long breath. Sherlock’s arm winds a little closer; John absently moves one foot back and forth between Sherlock’s to warm them.

It feels like the right thing to do.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Cairngorms are a mountain range in Scotland which are known for being the snowiest place in the UK although I think it's fairly snow-free there at the moment. Bothies are the little huts scattered here and there across the national park, and while privately owned, they are free to use for anyone who needs to use one. They are pretty vital places of refuge for hikers and other people who get caught out in the wild and the weather.


	23. All I Want for Christmas Is You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Johnlock.

**All I Want For Christmas Is You**

They get back late on the train from Scotland and John is exhausted. Mrs. Hudson has long since gone to bed by the time they limp up into the flat, speaking in whispers.

John tries to hang his coat on his peg and in his tiredness, misses and drops it on the floor. Sherlock stoops first to collect it, gesturing John into the flat.

“Thanks.”

John digs a hand into the middle of his back against a sore knot of muscle and tries to decide what he wants first; sleep or water or food or a shower. Sherlock typically decides for him.

“Merry Christmas,” he says, coming up at John’s elbow and holding out a gift. It’s not really been wrapped, though it’s wearing the traditional cloth hat. John stares at it stupidly.

“Oh, it’s jam.”

“It’s what you said you wanted.”

“Yeah, I did. Thank you.” There’s not been a time John has wanted jam more. “Don’t suppose you’ve got any toast in your pockets?”

“I think I can find some.”

John puts the jam on the kitchen table, goes upstairs and returns with a carrier bag. “If we’re doing them early then-Happy Christmas.”

Sherlock takes the bag and looks in it. It’s not one but two pairs of socks; one nice pair from somewhere branded, and one from the pound shop with a lot of snowflakes all over them. Sherlock sits down while the toast cooks and pulls off his own gritty socks in favour of the cheap ones.

“Warm at least,” he comments.

“You’re welcome.” John sinks into the chair opposite him, and thinks about how much he knows about how cold Sherlock’s feet get in bed. How somehow, he’s always known that. Sherlock notices him thinking but says nothing.

The toast pops and John absently smears it with butter and jam. Sherlock drowns a couple of teabags to make weak tea and they sit in the living room with the lights off, half nodding.

John is quiet. It’s not merely the quietness that comes from being tired. He’s thoughtful.  Sherlock rests his mug on the arm of his chair and then finally breaks the silence. 

“Nothing has to change.”

John wipes the crumbs from his hands, careful and slow, before he looks up. He doesn’t meet Sherlock’s eye, exactly. He’s trying to answer but the words, as always, are stuck in his throat. It was one night in a sleeping bag; it wasn’t even especially romantic if you’d experienced it. The smell of mould and being too cold and uncomfortable to sleep hadn’t become the prelude to any breakthrough. The slog back to civilization in the snow hadn’t lead to any overture beyond cursing unpredictable Scottish weather. To John it feels like it should have been a small thing, but it’s changing everything.

Sherlock tries again. 

“You’re still- I still hold you in high esteem.”

John gives a little choking laugh, and there’s more than a dash of sadness in his smile.

“Bad?”

“No,” John says, quiet but firm. “It's fine. That’s fine.”

Sherlock rubs at his own jaw-line, discomforted. He feels like a man walking on new ice, testing every step and worrying it’ll be his last on solid ground. Yet he’s reached a point where he can’t turn back.

“Do you want things to change or… stay the same?”

John licks his lower lip and waits for a long time for the words line up in his mouth. He doesn’t move; remains hunched slightly in his chair, both hands around his mug and then, finally he straightens up. 

“I don’t want things to change. I want them to be… something else. I think maybe- did I ever understand the situation?” 

Sherlock understands that this is not a question to which he has to supply an answer. John closes his mouth, breathes a little, asks, “What do you want?”

“This.”

John looks surprised. “Just this?” 

Sherlock closes his eyes like he’s gathering strength. “Everything. I’d take everything but I don’t presume- I have realistic expectations, John and as it happens I feel that my personal needs are minimal compared to what another person’s would be in this particular situation, so that while I would take more, I could ask for, yes, just this.” He opens his eyes again, fixes them to the wall above John’s shoulder. “This is enough to satisfy me.”

He doesn’t look to see if John is touched. He hears his breathing. Hears him put his mug down and sniff.

“What about being happy?” John wants to know. His tone of voice is new, and the cusp of what they’re on scares Sherlock so much that it doesn’t leave room for anything but honesty. 

“This is the closest I’ve ever come.”

John exhales like he’s been punched in the gut. “Jesus, don’t say that. Please don’t say that.” 

He reaches out and his fingers are warm and dry against Sherlock’s and strong too. John forces him to lean forward as he grasps Sherlock’s hands in his. He holds them like a misguided fortuneteller, staring at the backs of Sherlock’s hands as though he could find a script there to help him. 

“I want this,” John says slowly. “I don’t want to lose what we have.” 

“Is that a requirement?”

“Sometimes. Sometimes you trying being more and then it takes over and you can’t go back to being just friends.  I can’t do that.”

“Risk it?” 

“Not be your friend first. Not have you as a friend.”

“In other words...” Sherlock falters. There are things he could say that would be trite or make mockery of them both or slide off on to some other tangent where in a minute they could both shake their hands free and start the long, difficult process of pretending this conversation never happened. They could manage it; Sherlock has no doubt. They could manage to achieve just this. A life spent sitting opposite one another and not touching. The problem is that he doesn’t want to.

The problem is that, in this back and forth, he’s never taken a step ahead of John. Yet John has stymied himself in a bog of worries and possible outcomes, of his own life spent in avoiding the wrong kind of expression for his love for other men. 

“Just once,” he says, before his doubts can stop him. John looks up. 

“Once?” 

Sherlock shrugs, pinned now on his own offer. “Well we finished the case so there’s not going to be another murder today, and it  _is_  Christmas. Nearly. One time... that’s, that’s nothing, isn’t it? A joke gone a bit far.” 

John’s hands tighten; he looks cross. “I love you, Sherlock, more than anyone else I’ve ever met. I’m not kissing you for a joke.” 

“Oh.” 

Now it’s Sherlock’s turn to look away and wallow in an unexpected trough of emotion. He’s known it, or at least, had hoped for it for a long time but to hear it out loud is something quite different. He wishes he’d done something sooner. He wishes he’d kept his mouth shut about kissing. 

John doesn’t stand fully. He sort of creeps forward, hands still firm around Sherlock’s, and then for balance he has to put one knee on the corner of Sherlock’s chair. 

“John?”

“Shh. I’m doing something dangerous.”  

Sherlock closes his eyes and tilts his face slightly, and the press of John’s lips to his cheek is slow and warm. It reminds him that neither of them have shaved. John draws back, just a fraction. He lets go of one of Sherlock’s hands so he can support himself on the back of the armchair, but moves no further. Sherlock opens his eyes and looks at him. Like they’re playing opposites, John closes his. 

‘Oh, it’s my turn,’ Sherlock realises. He slips his fingers free of John’s grasp and instead slides them up John’s arm and rests them on his jumper, just over his ribs. John’s head is a little higher than his own, and he has to lean up slightly to kiss him.  

It’s a little reserved and amateurish, but he touches his lips to John’s, so it counts. John exhales a shuddery breath against his cheek, puts down his anxiety and picks up responsibility instead, and kisses him back more sweetly. 

There’s no crescendo to it; Sherlock half anticipates something but it doesn’t happen. They find their pace and it’s slow and thoughtful and neither of them wants to rush on to anything more, or stop. Instead they find a natural pause to breathe and gage one another. 

“Ok?” John asks. 

Sherlock feels the dazed, stupid smile spread on his face and can’t prevent it. John cups his face with one hand and looks pleased and relieved and happy as well. He glances over his shoulder, because this is still them telling each other secrets. 

“The world hasn’t ended,” Sherlock comments. 

“Don’t,” John says warningly, though his eyes sparkle.

“No hordes of paparazzi clawing at the windows.”

“Stop that,” John says, and kisses him again. Then he gets up, straightening his cardigan. It’s not an action designed or intended to fire anyone up, but it’s still possibly the most erotic thing Sherlock’s seen John do. Mostly because  _he himself rumpled him._

“Technically,” Sherlock says, deliberately lolling in his chair. “It’s not Christmas yet.” 

John picks up the mugs and eyebrows at him. 

“Christmas eve is tomorrow,” Sherlock reminds him. “Christmas day is after. In fact,” He swings his legs from the chair and follows John to the kitchen. “Some people count Christmas as lasting until Candlemas Eve.” 

“When’s that?” John asks, rising to the bait gladly, for the touch of what passes as normality for them. 

“February second.”

“Oh, you don’t want much then.” John puts the mugs in the sink and turns back, one thumb rubbing at the corner of his mouth. Sherlock plays coy by the door, brimming with happiness. It’s not gone wrong. John’s thinking about it. 

“Go to bed,” John says finally, turning out the light. “Your bed,” he adds, firm. 

“I thought I might sit up.”

“Alright,” John moves towards the stairs to his own room. “Just remember, if you don’t sleep, Father Christmas won’t come.” 

“Oh, will he not?” 

“No,” John says and then softens. “Goodnight.” 

“Yes,” Sherlock answers, “It is.”   


	24. Saint Nicholas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Conclusion to the Nutcracker AU

**St. Nicholas**

It begins on Christmas Eve; too early. The other side has the bloodstained silk, the sword, the rifle and the oldest parts of the magic. They have the blood of rats and sacrifice. They have the words. They have drawn the circle.

Sherlock feels it first as a jerk behind his lungs, startling enough that he drops his violin and feels at his chest.

John stands up on the hearth, looking at his hands with deep worry.

“It’s starting now,” he says.

Breathless, Sherlock turns to him. “How?”

“They’re trying to bind as much of me as possible to them, I think. The magic doesn’t like being changed.”

Sherlock feels it in his blood- the throb of something unnatural. It is already dark out and the lamps are lit. He twitches the curtains, unsettled, and notices that a fog is rising. That can’t be natural either.

“Sherlock,” John says. “I want you to know. Be careful. I can’t put his wish into words but I saw it- another boy died. He’s a killer. He has a certain control over it.” John sounds guilty.

Sherlock considers the wanton destruction of the flat, which he’s only been able to partially repair. A child whose deepest wish is to murder? “He’s mad, you mean.”

“He was bad as a child, now I think he’s something more. He’s fixated on owning the magic.”

“And you.”

“Yes.”

“That’s not going to happen.”

“Whatever happens,” John says, “I’m going to grant your wish.”

“How can I stop him?”

“I don’t know,” John answers, “We’re at a disadvantage Sherlock. He’s been studying this all his life; all he had to do was find me and now he has.”

“Can we find him?” Sherlock asks.

John points at the wall. “We don’t have to.”

Sherlock turns and stares. The walls are fading into the fog; he can smell the cold and earth. He can smell snow on the air, and pine.

“Sherlock,” John says urgently as the floor starts to vanish into it. Sherlock stoops and plucks him into his arms. John sits in the crook of his elbow, knife drawn.

“John, what will happen?”

“We go into the forest, you’ll come out. I promise, Sherlock. You’ll be safe.”

“That wasn’t what I was asking,” Sherlock says, uneasy. He wishes he were armed. John’s knife is sharp- it’ll do nothing against two men if they decide to make this a fight.

He arms himself instead with the one weapon that has always served him well- information. He flicks again through the photographs of the pages from The Living Doll; which he has realized is flawed but there must be a clue there somewhere.

He freezes. There’s a trickle of light coming from somewhere and a humming; something old and minor. Circles, Sherlock thinks. He saw them in the book.

“Here we go. Stay close. Whatever happens…” John grips at his arm.

There’s no running away from this. John is the centre of the circle within the circles and it’s cold; the air is biting and the pine trees around them show like vague fingers in the gloom.

“ _Down in yon forest there stands a hall. The bells of Paradise, I heard them ring;_ ”

It’s a nasal, whining voice, but there are bells ringing, Sherlock realizes. Distant, from the opposite side to the humming.

“Sleigh bells?”

“Coins. The old man,” John says. He’s nervous, peering into the fog. This isn’t like normal. Typically it’s just him and the fog, the receiver of the wish and the old man to observe. This time it’s a little more crowded.

The circles start to merge. Figures emerge from the gloom, weirdly lit from below. On one side the fog seems darker, on the other brighter. Sherlock can still smell the snow.

Something seems to move them against their own accord. The tall man with the gold book and the rifle, the small man with the bloodstained silk and the stolen sack of John’s possessions. They space out- three corners of an unbalanced square.

The old man is less distinct. He stays in the fog, leaning on a stick, and now and then the cloud parts enough to give Sherlock a glimpse of a long beard and loops of coins on the staff and at his belt.

The nasal voice salutes them. “Hope you don’t mind; waiting for Christmas is always such a bore and me, I get soooo impatient.”

“Your circle is smeared,” Sherlock says, not looking at him. “You’re messing with it and it doesn’t like it.”

“Oh but it likes me. It’s on my side.” The shadow wavers and seems to become more solid. To Sherlock’s right, a pair of eyes watches from the fog, calm and reserved. To the left there are three; the tall man who is nervous, the darting grin of the small man and something else just behind him.

‘This is old,’ Sherlock thinks. ‘This is very old.’ This is every story he was told as a child- don’t go into the woods at night, the dark and the light, the good and the bad and ugly things; anger or kindness. This is blood put down on the snow to make the winter go away. This is spitting to keep out the devil and iron nailed over your door.

‘Where’s the rest?’ Sherlock thinks, frowning. Somehow he feels an innate interpretation of their roles. There is evil, he can see, and evil’s tool. John is the fulcrum on which all of this is moving; the old man glows benignly but he feels like an observer, pulled in against his will. ‘Where’s the other side?’

He finds himself all too aware of the empty corner of the square.

Outside the forest, the bells of London begin to chime for midnight. It is Christmas- not the end of it but the start. Sherlock shifts, trying to keep both in his sight. Ice crunches beneath his heels.

“Sherlock? What’s your wish?” John says. The glow has spread to him too now; faint but discernable thanks to the darkness of the fog.

“Not yet,” Sherlock returns. He looks at him. John’s face has gone blank as porcelain. More like a doll than ever. “I need more time.”

“There isn’t any; I just need to see it and then I’ll grant it.”

“No,” Sherlock says stubbornly. If John does, his bond to Sherlock will be broken. Sherlock can physically see it now, a little, weak thread of light.  
The Irish man laughs.

“Get on with it,” he mocks and the shadow grates, “ _The bells of hell go ting-a-ling-a-ling for you but not for me, and the little devil’s how they sing-a-ling-a-ling, for you but not for me_.”

“Shut up!”

Sherlock closes his eyes. The information is there, in his head. He feels for it. All of this; built up and built up, Arabic magic mixed with something else, added to and muddied by Europeans and now this new mutation. It’s complex.

“Make it simple,” he mutters to himself. Why did they do all this to begin with? Who owns all of the magic really? Who is this between?

The cold wind caresses his ears making them ache, the ice around his feet makes them cold.

“Winter,” he says.

“Sherlock?”

“What are you doing?”

The strands of light are moving. Sherlock bends and buries his hands in the snow. “You’re clever,” Sherlock says, “But go back far enough and they didn’t need words, or accessories. Not to beat you.”

The shadow roils behind the Irish man and Sherlock can see it now; that creeping beast, that biter of children and gross opportunist throughout the long winter when most animals are decently sleeping. That spreader of disease; that thief. John always checks for them.

“Rat.” Sherlock hisses.

The old man jingles as he steps forward, even as Moriarty and his shadow emit a squeal of hatred.

“Oh, I see it now.” Sherlock looks around, his mind lighting up with understanding, which isn’t quite his own. The empty corner seems to sing to him with bells and ice.

“Balance; your ancestor couldn’t make a spell without him- patron saint of the feast. You made a child’s toy of John and thought no one would stand in his corner.” Sherlock rises, leaving John on the floor, his fists full of snow. “Protection.”

The rat lunges but is stopped by some hidden line. The golden book clatters to the ground. Moran has his rifle raised, but no idea who to shoot. Sherlock can smell his panic. This isn’t what he signed up for. Moriarty seems to writhe.

The old man can do nothing but watch- his presence is enough.

Sherlock feels for the power. The darkest part of winter stands before him; he must find the brightest part of it. His fingers are numb with cold but he feels it; the glint of light on snow, the white sheen of a sunbeam through an icicle.

“Here’s a fact,” Sherlock says, over the drumming humming mad fury of the rat. “This is science. You never win. The sun will always rise, the night will always end- the snow will melt. More than a million years of invention work against you. We ignore the setting of the sun and put on the lights. We don’t feel the cold; we play with it.”

“Sherlock!”

The rat leaps with everything it has; the gun roars, but Sherlock is being risen on a wave of old, old power that isn’t his own and can’t be stopped. It’s been waiting, he thinks, caught up in this stupid round-and-round-and-roundabout-again for two hundred years, lacking just a vessel to use. The result of one ambitious man upsetting something he had no right to touch.

Even the rat seems to want to end it, Sherlock thinks. It wants the fight, not the stalemate.

Sherlock claps his hands together, full of snow, in front of the rat’s face. The light is blinding.

Later neither of them can say exactly what happened. There was light; there was the flash of something like a sword and the rat vanished. John thought he saw Moriarty stumbling back, his face a wide ‘O’ of shock and a rose of blood blooming through his shirt from the stray bullet.

There had been other people; other attempts, or else time here is as strange as the forest. They blow past in a crowd; a horde of rats, soldiers of all nations, snowflakes and last, as Sherlock turns, a smiling being in white passes right through him, leaving him with a taste of sugar.

The forest grows quiet as the battle fades. The fog lightens.

Sherlock turns back and finds John still sitting in the middle of the circle, restored. He rises to his feet, one hand on the hilt of his sword, eyes lifted under his hat. He looks faintly amazed; a bit lost.

Sherlock looks down, turns his hands over; his sleeves are as white as he’s ever seen. The old man jangles, wordless and smiling as he leans on his staff. The shadows have fled.  
“What’s your wish, Sherlock?”

Sherlock kneels on the ground before him. The circles have met at last, overlapping. John shoulders his pack, ready to march. They are, in both senses of the word, not out of the woods yet.

“Where will you go?”

“I don’t know,” John answers. “To wherever the magic pulls me. Let me grant your wish, Sherlock.”

“I never showed you all of London.”

“You only had a month, Sherlock.” John smiles, “You managed plenty. I should thank you. I’ve got a lot to thank you for.” He comes forward, places his hands on Sherlock’s knees. “Maybe you can choose for me. The next one. Ruby put me in the post to you, and there was no guarantee I’d arrive, but I did. Choose someone for me.”

It’s unfair, Sherlock thinks. The bells are ringing. Despite himself, he feels something in him wishing. The light is there.

“Will you grant it,” the old man asks.

“Don’t,” Sherlock begs.

“I will,” John replies, eyes on him. “Of course I will.”

The coins scatter, the fog falls, and the wish is granted.

\----

John feels breath on his face as he wakes, breathes against the confines of his belt. He stirs, confused, his last memories of snow and rats, and there’s a weight on his body.

Have they left the lid on him?

He can see a ceiling, which must be very low; perhaps he’s under a shelf or on one. He’ll have to be careful getting out. He pushes, blinking and wincing at the light, trying to rise. A limb moves at his side.

Sherlock lifts his head, his hair in disarray. John stares at him.

“Sherlock?” His heart sinks in horror. This isn’t what he wanted. How could Sherlock have wished for this; to be part of the spell for all time; they’ll be separated. One doll is already one too many-

“Why did you wish this?” John asks, distraught. “How could you be so stupid!?”

“John?” Sherlock rises a little, stiff, his clothes still brilliantine white. “John, you’re the perfect size.” He fumbles, touching John’s face, amazed. “Look at you.”

“I’m not- you’ve-“ John breaks off because he’s noticed the wall behind Sherlock. The pattern of the wallpaper looks small. He holds his hand up to compare and then, in a rush, staggers to his feet.

His own height gives him a weird sense of vertigo. He can see the tops of the tables; the view from the window down to the cars on the road, the seat of the sofa, all of the floor. His knees go weak and Sherlock catches him heavily. Too heavy to hold up. They sag together back to the floor, Sherlock’s back to the armchair.

John puts his hand against Sherlock’s. It’s smaller, but not terribly so.

“It’s Christmas day, John,” Sherlock murmurs in his ear. “You granted the wish and you’re still awake.”

John grasps at his hand, breathing hard with wonder. “I didn’t see your wish.”

“I think you’re seeing it now,” Sherlock says, a smile in his voice.

John tilts his head back to look at him. Overcome, he reaches up and grasps Sherlock, pulling him close. Sherlock doesn’t let go.

“I’m alive,” John croaks against the side of his face. “I’m alive again. You wished for me.” It is overwhelming. He has freedom again; no living name nor convenience, but is neither aware of this nor does he care. He could walk down the stairs in a matter of mere paces and walk through London. He could sit in the corner of an inn and drink and watch the people come and go with the disinterest of a stranger. He could leave London; leave England. Travel and see how all the places in this new time have been changed. He could cross the sea in a few hours and explore the new world.

With the beat of Sherlock’s heart in his ear, he knows that he can, but he won’t. Not alone. He turns, slightly, serious.

“You love me.”

“I-“ Sherlock starts, and the words are lost in the crush of John’s lips against his own.

“Marry me,” John says, when they breathe again, the red of his coat against the white of Sherlock’s, like blood on snow, like peppermint, “I read the news; it’s a fair law here now. Marry me.”

Sherlock feels a laugh bubbling up as the armchair slips back under their weight, tumbling them to the floor, and John’s eyes are blue and bright as the winter sky, full of life.

Something clinks free from John’s pocket. They will find fistfuls of coins, in John’s pockets, in his knapsack. Outside a rare snow is falling, despite the sunshine. Not that it matters. All of the gold and silver Sherlock wants is in John’s hair. They’re each warm enough to ignore any ice. He kisses him.

“Yes,” he says.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Moriarty is singing 'Down in Yon Forest' again from a previous chapter. He is also singing 'The Bells of Hell go Ting-a-ling-a-ling' which is a British airman's song from WW1.


	25. Christmas Morning

**Christmas Morning**

The bells ring across London.

Mrs. Hudson is a bundle of energy and cheer, humming as she bustles around with a potato peeler in one hand and a glass of sherry in the other.

“Oh I  _am_  glad you boys decided to get over yourselves and have a nice Christmas after all,” she says, celebrating a little too much.

John bites his lip and shares a look from Sherlock, who is trying not to either look disgusted or laugh. Mrs. Hudson shuffles past and hugs John, and it’s impossible to be annoyed with her. 

“It’s nice,” John agrees. He drops a handful of chopped carrots into a pan and passes it to her. The turkey crown is already in the oven; Sherlock is already ensconced in his armchair, avoiding the chores by wielding his violin. 

He plays a short version of ‘We Wish You a Merry Christmas’ and stops as soon as Mrs. Hudson starts to sing. She just laughs and nudges John into joining her, which he does just to exasperate Sherlock. 

“Ooh, crackers,” she exclaims, and totters off to find the box that she’s had stashed away since last year.

“You can stop now,” Sherlock suggests, once she’s out the door.

“We won’t go until we get some,” John hums back, joggling around the table and looking like an idiot. He turns the gas on under the saucepans and comes over to bother Sherlock with seasonal inanities. “We  _won’t_  go until we  _get_ some, we won’t go until we-“ 

“There,” Sherlock says, pulling back, “You got some, now stop.”

John grins, hastily steals another kiss before Mrs. Hudson returns. 

“Play something else,” he suggests. 

—

In Westminster, Big Ben echoes across the river, tolling the ages.  Lestrade plugs one finger in his ear and speaks louder. 

“You’re having a good day then?” 

Mycroft eavesdrops without quite meaning to; the girl is speaking loudly enough to be audible as an incomprehensible chatter on the other end of the line.

“Yeah? Were the boots ok? They fitted?”

A longer squabble of noise from the phone. Lestrade catches his eyes and swipes a hand across his brow in relief. She liked the boots, it appears.

“Cool. Me? Yeah, I’m alright. I’m at a, um, friend’s house. Weelll, it’s a bit quiet. Yeah, Westminster, that’s Big Ben you can hear.” Lestrade cackles suddenly. “I’ll tell him that.”

“I shan’t deny it,” Mycroft says, eyeing him. “I am posh.”

“He can cook though,” Lestrade adds in a loud stage whisper. “That’s why I’m really here.”  He laughs again. “Alright. Love you. Bye then.” 

He hangs up.

“She’s as cheeky as you are.”

“Worse,” Lestrade says, dropping himself heavily onto the sofa, “She’s smarter.”

“I heard you’re only here because I can cook.”

Lestrade grins and mouths at his ear. “I only said that because I can’t talk about all the other things you’re good at. Official secrets act and all that.”

Mycroft reddens and pushes him off. “Go away and lay the table.”

Lestrade gets up, squeezing his shoulder and goes to do as he’s told. Before he does, he drops his phone in Mycroft’s lap.

“Ring your brother.”

Mycroft raises an eyebrow at the phone. For once he feels like he might. “I rather think he’ll be busy,” he says, with the trace of a smile.

—

“Heya, you up here?”

“Sally, you’re early,” Molly scrabbles to open the office door, glancing around and then beckoning her in with a look of mischief. 

“Hullo.”

There’s a couple of young morgue techs as well as Molly. She points them out to Sally. “This is Tina and Scott. Christmas morgue team. This is Sally.”

“Christmas police team,” Sally introduces herself. They seem nice, though a bit shy.

Molly upends the frozen bottle of vodka into a cold glass and tops it up with something from a thermos and passes it to Sally. “Welcome to the party.”

“Must be now I’m here. Four people,” Sally comments. “What am I drinking?”

“Vodka apple thing. Scott’s secret recipe. They’re good.” 

Sally sniffs at it; it smells as you might expect, of vodka, apple and a bit of vanilla. “Cheers then.”

“Cheers!” They knock glasses and then, with an unspoken need to break the ice, down their drinks.

“Phwoar,” Sally says, “That’s got a kick.” Tina giggles.

Molly feels for her bag and pulls on her coat. “Ok, I think we should go get that curry.”

They leave the hospital, naturally falling into pairs; Tina and Scott leading the way and Molly and Sally behind.

“Thanks for the invite,” Sally says, as they clamber down the steps to the tube. Somehow she’s ended up with the thermos, which sloshes comfortingly in her bag at every step. 

“Oh, you’re welcome.” Molly glances at her, and then lowers her voice. “They’re nice, but a bit boring.”

“I’ll try not to be boring,” Sally promises. Molly pinches her lips together in amusement.

“Deal,” she says. 

—

There are no bells in this cold town but the glasses in the bar of the hotel lounge chime and tinkle as they slide on a sleigh of laughter. Irene turns her face from the dark window where she can see reflected a wonderfully familiar woman, and smiles to her companion. He is flustered and charmed. Her smile widens and warms.

“Tell me about yourself,” she says, the corners of her eyes lifted by kohl. He refills her flute with a froth of bubbles and blusters; ‘how quaint’, she thinks, and listens carefully to the money between his words. 

— 

After dinner, and after Mrs. Hudson has gone downstairs for a snooze, they have the living room to themselves. John stretches out in his chair, balancing a port on one arm. Sherlock draws the curtains against the dark, leaving them in the flickering light of the fire and the ever-changing lights of the Christmas tree.

Sherlock steps over and steals John’s glass out the way, reaching down and joining their hands together. 

“I’m really full,” John complains, good-naturedly.

“Up.” 

John groans and nearly pulls Sherlock into his lap. It’s a temptation, but Sherlock pushes his heels into the floor and slowly but surely John rises.

“What are we doing?” 

“It’s Christmas.”

He slides an arm around John’s waist and re-arranges his other hand in John’s.

“Oh,” John says, trying to look at his feet. Sherlock just chuckles, his voice like truffle. 

“Just don’t tread on my feet,” he advises.

He doesn’t try for anything complicated. Not even a waltz because that’s too reminiscent of other people in other times past. Instead they dance like they’re already old and long married; a back and forth sway that barely leaves the spot they’re standing on; just an elongated embrace.

Sherlock lowers his head and breathes in the smell of John’s collar. John kisses him with all the time in the world. 

Then he yawns.

“You’ve eaten too much,” Sherlock tells him. John squeezes him around the middle with a grunt. “I could do with a lie-down for a bit,” he agrees.

“I suppose you’d better or you’ll be in a foul mood later.”

John squeezes him again. “Alright then.” He yawns again, moving towards the bedroom. Somehow he forgets to let go of Sherlock before falling into bed. 

Sherlock doesn’t see any reason to remind him.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the end of the advent; I’ve enjoyed writing this so much and I just want to say thank you to all the wonderful comments I’ve received this month while i’ve been writing it. You’ve been lovely and helped me to recapture a bit of Christmas feeling. I hope you all have a cracking day celebrating whichever seasonal holiday you celebrate, and here to 2016, the sherlock special and another year of fanfic to come. 
> 
> Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays and all the best for the New Year.
> 
> \- Odamaki xxx


	26. Contents Masterlist

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is a list of hyperlinks to the various chapters, organised by group if you're only interested in Johnlock or whatever.

**25 Days of Fic-mas Master List**

 

**Johnlock**

1) [Shopping For Gifts](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12306818)

2) [Hot Cocoa](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12318200)

5) [Ghost of Christmas Past](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12377465)

8) [Baking](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12429743)

11) [Mulled Wine](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12483731)

22) [Snowed In](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12680765)

23) [All I Want For Christmas Is You](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12712913)

25) [Christmas Morning](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12758195) 

 

**Mystrade**

3) [Winter Wonderland](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12338669)

6) [Naughty and Nice](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12390260)

14) [Trimming the Tree](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12531194)

20) [All Wrapped Up](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12658859)

25) [Christmas Morning](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12758195)

 

**Jolto**

4) [Christmas Cards](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12352781)

21) [Christmas Movies or Specials](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12674624)

 

**Nutcracker AU**

AS ORIGINALLY POSTED:  
7) [The Nutcracker](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12412109)

13) [Warming Up By the Fire](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12513197)

16) [Family Traditions](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12578426)

17) [Christmas Without You](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12628766)

19) [Christmas Songs](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12647582)

24) [Saint Nicholas](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12735854)

COLLATED AND REPOSTED:  
[Saint Nicholas](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5515976)

 

**Sally Donovan and the New Scotland Yarders**

10) [Scrooge](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12462959)

15) [Christmas Party](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12558020)

25) [Christmas Morning](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12758195)

 

 

**Irene Adler**

9) [Making a Christmas List](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12443945)

25) [Christmas Morning](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12758195)

 

**Shifter AU**

12) [Ugly Christmas Jumpers](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12497042)

 

**Potterlock AU**

18) [Mistletoe](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5329976/chapters/12634169)


End file.
